is it just nothing? if i went to space with an open jar, closed it in space, and then studied what was inside, would there just be nothing? not a single atom? a photon maybe? how is space black if it is nothing?
In: Physics
There is a small amount of stuff in most places. Close to the Earth there is still some oxygen, water, nitrogen and such which have escaped the Earth atmosphere but is not quite out of the gravitational well yet. Some of these are captured in the magentic Van Allen belt around the Earth. The Sun have a similar field of particles around it but much less dense and it goes much further out. Even going beyond all the planets. The Voyager probes are currently crossing the boarders of this region and have probably crossed most of it. Beyond the solar system there is also a gas and dust cloud throughout the galaxy. Some places this becomes dense enough that it blocks light, although only when several light years deep. Even between the galaxies there is a thin vail of gas and some dust. As for the density of any of this it is very low. Your jar is probably not going to contain any single atom even as low as the orbit of the ISS.
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