Mass of the Sun
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| Bibliographic Entry | Result (w/surrounding text) |
Standardized Result |
|---|---|---|
| Cutnell, John D., & Johnson W. Kenneth. Physics- 3rd Edition.New York: Wiley, 1995: inside front cover. | "Sun, Mass, 1.99 × 1030kg" | 1.99 × 1030 kg |
| "Solar System." Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia. Microsoft Corporation, 1995. | "Although this nuclear fusion is destroying 600 million metric tons of hydrogen each second, the sun is so massive (2 × 1030 kg, 4.4 × 1030 lbs) that it can continue to shine at its present brightness for 6 billion years." | 2 × 1030 kg |
| Davison, E. Soper. Mass of the Sun. University of Oregon. | "M ~ 2 × 1030kg." | 2 × 1030 kg |
| Weast, Robert C. Handbook of Chemistry and Physics. Florida: CRC Press, 1980: F-178 | "Mass (kg), 1.991 ± .002E30" | 1.991 × 1030 kg |
| Hamilton, Calvin J. Sun. PlanetScapes. | "Mass in kg 1.989E+30" | 1.989 × 1030 kg |
The sun is the most prominent feature in our solar system. It is the largest object and contains approximately 98% of the total solar system mass. To measure the mass of the sun we will use Newton's laws of motion together with his law of gravity. Those laws give a relation between the period (T) of a planet's orbit, the distance (a) from the planet to the sun, and a constant (G) measured in laboratory experiments. To measure the mass of the sun we will assume that the orbits are circles, and that the mass of a planet is tiny compared to the mass of the sun.
M = 4π2a3/GT2
Using this relation with T for the earth we get the mass of the sun. The period of the Earth is 31,536,000 seconds and the distance from the Earth to the sun is 1.496 × 1011 m.
M = 4(3.14)2(1.496 × 1011 m)3/
The mass of the sun is thus 1.99 × 1030 kg
Leon Vaysburd -- 2000