Do you know that a normal human being has a temperature of 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit or 37.0 degrees Celsius? When a person’s temperature goes above 98.6 Fahrenheit, we say that he has a fever. Well Sun’s temperature at the surface of the Sun is about 10,000 Fahrenheit or 5,600 Celsius, so the sun has a fever always. Doesn’t it?
We all know that the Sun is a star. Are all the stars hot like the sun? A star is generally defined as a big hot burning ball of gas. Some are much hotter than the sun and appear blue. Some lesser hot than the Sun and they appear red. By looking at the color of a star scientists can guess what the temperature must be like. All stars need some fuel to burn. Sun uses hydrogen as its fuel.
Sun undergoes a “nuclear fusion” reaction which fuses two atoms of Hydrogen to make one Helium molecule. Okay! Hold on! Let us try an understand the process of nuclear fusion. Take two similar lumps of clay( like atoms). Now fuse them together form a bigger chunk (a molecule). This is what happens at Sun, the only difference being that this nuclear fusion releases massive amount of energy. The Sun radiates this energy which keeps us all super hot.
This discussion leaves us with one more question. What will happen when our Sun is out of fuel?