What is the difference between stars and suns

Planets are just clumps of stuff like the Earth and give off no visible light, except whatever happens to bounce off them from a nearby star. Stars are extremely hot and therefore glow, like fire or an incandescent light bulb. What keeps them hot are nuclear reactions, kind of like in a hydrogen bomb, only running steadily rather than in a short burst.

There are other types of stars, and somewhat different planets e. I know that stars are really suns burning away in the distance but It just seems strange that why do we have our own sun when there are loads more suns in the sky then does that mean there are more planets that just havent been found yet?

Thanks Rhiannon xxxxx - Rhiannon Jones age 16 wales wrexham. Nice questions. You're right- there are lots of planets around other stars. Since planets are so much smaller and dimmer than stars, they're hard to see.

However, in recent years a number of big planets have been found around nearby stars. As techniques have improved, smaller planets have also been found.

So there are lots of planets around. We really have no idea what fraction of these other planets have life, because we don't know how likely life is to get started even on a hospitable planet. I know that Stars are suns and alot of the above questions helped me win a debate with my girlfriend, so thanks for the ammunition. Another debate we are having are about twinkling stars, she seems to think they're aeroplanes or helicopters Stars twinkle because the light from them passes through the atmosphere, which has density variations which change in time.

That's like passing through a constantly shifting set of lenses. It makes the image move around just a little. I think it happens with all stars, unless you're viewing from space. Maybe it's most noticeable with the brighter ones. There are several connections between visible stars and black holes.

Large stars collapse to form black holes when they use up their nuclear fuel. Often one star will be in orbit around a black hole. Stars cluster in groups called galaxies, which often have very large black holes near the center. Stars sometimes get swallowed up by black holes. There are probably other connections, but those come to mind. Well, they are not really stars at all but tiny bits of micro-meteorites that enter the earth's atmosphere and are heated to incandescence by the friction of the air.

They get white hot and make a streak of light through the sky. They usually get burned up before they reach the ground but a particularly large one can make it all the way. Several times a year the earth passes through large clouds of meteor dust and an exceptional display of shooting stars can be seen. One good example is the Perseids shower which occurs around August 12th this year. Take a look at for more details. All of the stars you can see with the naked eye are from our own galaxy, the Milky Way.

On a moonless night you can see several galaxies, such as the Andromeda, as faint smudges but you can't discern individual stars without a big telescope. In the first question that was presented, you stated that stars are gases mainly compressed by gravity. Not sure if i will read your reply so could u please send it to my email - Edwin A age 18 California. We only do Web postings, not email answers.

Anyway, gravity doesn't consist of those other types of bonds, which all come from electromagnetic forces. Gravity follows very different laws than electromagnetism does. For example, gravity is always attractive. There are attempts to at least understand gravity in the same framework as the other forces, but so far those haven't been fully successful.

At the level of ordinary experience, gravity is a completely separate force. I have basic knowledge about astronomy. I always wondered though. What age stage our sun is on as a star?

Our sun, a very ordinary star, is living comfortably in middle age as it travels along the road of the Main Sequence evolution line. It was born about 4. At this time much of the fuel in the sun will have been burned and the sun will turn first into a red giant and then shrink into a white dwarf and senility. During the red giant phase, the sun's radius increases and will actually engulf the inner planets including the earth.

After that it will collapse into a very small whitish star. The Sun is not massive enough to become a supernova or a black hole. See for some interesting details. From your last answer, does that mean life will end in about billion years from now when sun will stop shining.

They exist in a stable state of nuclear fusion, converting hydrogen to helium and radiating x-rays. This process emits an enormous amount of energy, keeping the star hot and shining brightly.

Some stars shine more brightly than others. Their brightness is a factor of how much energy they put out—known as luminosity —and how far away from Earth they are. Color can also vary from star to star because their temperatures are not all the same. Hot stars appear white or blue, whereas cooler stars appear to have orange or red hues. By plotting these and other variables on a graph called the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, astronomers can classify stars into groups.

Along with main sequence and white dwarf stars, other groups include dwarfs, giants, and supergiants. Supergiants may have radii a thousand times larger than that of our own sun. Stars spend 90 percent of their lives in their main sequence phase. Now around 4. As stars move toward the ends of their lives, much of their hydrogen has been converted to helium.

Helium sinks to the star's core and raises the star's temperature—causing its outer shell of hot gases to expand. These large, swelling stars are known as red giants.

The red giant phase is actually a prelude to a star shedding its outer layers and becoming a small, dense body called a white dwarf. White dwarfs cool for billions of years. Some, if they exist as part of a binary star system , may gather excess matter from their companion stars until their surfaces explode, triggering a bright nova. Eventually all white dwarfs go dark and cease producing energy. At this point, which scientists have yet to observe, they become known as black dwarfs.

Massive stars eschew this evolutionary path and instead go out with a bang—detonating as supernovae. While they may appear to be swelling red giants on the outside, their cores are actually contracting, eventually becoming so dense that they collapse, causing the star to explode.

If you have figured out the difference between the stars and planets in the night sky, how can you tell which planet that you are looking at? One way to tell the difference is by observing the colour of the planet. Not all the planets in our solar system have a specific colour, however the most prominent planets in the night sky can appear to have some sort of colouration. It is recommended to use a telescope on a clear night if you are trying to distinguish the colour difference between the planets in the night sky.

The easiest planets to spot in the night sky are Mercury, Venus and Mars. They can even be seen with the naked eye on a clear night if you know where to look and are visible almost all year, except for short periods of time where they are a little too close to the sun. Keep reading to find out how you can view each of these planets in the night sky!

Mercury is the smallest of the planets that is visible to the naked eye and shines as an evening star in the western sky, setting around about an hour after the sun sets. In the eastern sky, Mercury can be seen rising about one hour before the sun. If you are looking for Mercury in the night sky, you must have a clear, unobstructed view of the horizon.

You may find that Mercury appears as a bright star with a yellowish hue. Our Sun is pretty impressive, but how does it compare to other stars?

There are billions more stars in the Milky Way galaxy - the galaxy we call home. And there are many, many more in the rest of the universe. Is our Sun special? It turns out that our Sun is an average sized star. There are bigger stars, and there are smaller stars. We have found stars that are times bigger in diameter than our sun. Truly, those stars are enormous.