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In: Planetary Science
The sun is a huge ball of mostly-hydrogen. If you’re in the middle of it you’re under incredible pressure, because there’s thousands of kilometers of hydrogen sitting on top of you. That pressure is so intense it can crush atoms together. Generally two atoms of hydrogen get mashed into each other and that produces a helium atom, and a massive amount of heat.
The sun is blazing hot because of the fusion heat being produced at its core. That heat works its way up out of the core toward the surface, and the glowing-hot surface radiates heat, light, ultraviolet, X-rays and gamma rays out into space. That radiation gets to Earth, fortunately our atmosphere soaks up most of the really deadly stuff, and what we get is mostly heat, visible light and a touch of UV.
The Sun is roughly 5 billion years old, and we think it has about 5 billion years left in it. Eventually it won’t have any more hydrogen in the high-pressure region, the fusion will stop and it’ll end up as a burnt-out remnant called a white dwarf.
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