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  1. Naked Science Forum
  2. On the Lighter Side
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  4. Why is the Sun such a perfect sphere?
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Why is the Sun such a perfect sphere?

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Offline Craig W. Thomson (OP)

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Re: Why is the Sun such a perfect sphere?
« Reply #40 on: 23/09/2015 18:40:21 »
Quote from: Thebox on 23/09/2015 10:26:49
How can anyone be wrong if there is no present answer to start off with?
"I have all the answers , cant explain it great, but I do know what everything is all about and nobody seems to be interested sincerely because they cant understand ."

 [;)]
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Offline Craig W. Thomson (OP)

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Re: Why is the Sun such a perfect sphere?
« Reply #41 on: 23/09/2015 19:09:37 »
Quote from: chiralSPO on 22/09/2015 18:14:33
It seems to me that you are suggesting that because the rate of fusion is determined by the pressure (and temperature) of the plasma, any region of the sun that expands would see a reduction in fusion, causing it to cool and compress back to equilibrium, and any part of the sun would also resist compression by heating up and expanding due to increased fusion rate.

If this is a misinterpretation of your theory, please correct me so we are discussing the same thing. If it sounds right, please keep reading...

This equilibrium sounds reasonable to me, but I think it only ensures predictable density, and doesn't have a tremendous influence on the shape (symmetry) of the sun. Including gravity and the fusion equilibrium without any other forces around would certainly have a spherical optimum geometry. But I don't think that it will compensate other factors such as net rotation or magnetic field oscialtions to maintain the spherical shape. I am either misunderstanding something, or some other explanation is needed.
Actually, I hadn't considered the rate of fusion. I think the rate of fusion in the Sun should be pretty constant without major fluctuations because if there were such fluctuations, the Sun would likely change size as a response.
 
Basically, I am starting with the premise that plasma behaves like a gas. When you put gas in a container, it fills up that container, pressing on the walls. If you turn up the temperature, the molecules move faster in general, and so the pressure on the walls of the container increases.

That's what I think is happening in the case of fusion. Gravity makes a "container" for the Sun's plasma that tends to be spherical, while the Sun's rotation causes bulging at the equator. At the same time, fusion raises the temperature of the plasma in that container causing an isotropic pressure, just like the gas in a bottle. Photons created by fusion in the Sun don't go straight to the surface and fly off into space. They can take thousands of years to reach the surface, being absorbed and re-emitted continuously, adding their energy back into the pool of temperature and density over and over again as they bump into neighboring particles crammed together by gravity. In my view, that trapped photon energy is a mechanism that presses outward at the poles, cancelling some of the Sun's equatorial bulging.

Earlier in the thread, I used a basketball as an analogy. Of course, a basketball will pop if you increase the pressure too much, so the analogy is not perfect, but basically, if you sit on that basketball, you cause "flattening at the poles." If you pump up the basketball a bit more, isotropic pressure from within will cancel some of flattening caused by your weight, pressing the "poles" outward. In a nutshell, that's the process I'm trying to describe when I say fusion pressure cancels most of the Sun's equatorial bulging.

Again, I don't think the rate of fusion changes a lot. An increased rate of fusion would produce more isotropic pressure, which I believe would "inflate" the Sun to a larger size, while slowing down the rate of fusion would likely shrink it.
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