if there is no oxygen in outer space how does the sun stay on fire if fire needs oxygen?

Answer 1

The Sun isn't really on fire - nuclear fusion (which needs no oxygen) in the core produces all the Sun's energy.

Answer 2

the sun doesn't "burn." burning is a conventional chemical change, meaning that the nuclei of the atoms aren't involved. instead, with the case of the sun, or any other star, immense pressure and heat in the core makes 4 hydrogen atoms fuse together into 1 helium atom. since one helium atom weighs slightly less than 4 hydrogen, the extra matter is being converted directly into energy! this is a nuclear chemical reaction. the energy output is tremendous, and is how the heat from the sun is felt a whole 93 million miles away.

if the sun used oxygen to "burn" instead of the nuclear fusion, then our sun would burn out 1 billion times as fast, and put out less than one trillionth of the heat. also, the result would be water, so after the sun burned out, we would be able to go swimming! I never thought of that!

in short, the sun doesn't need oxygen to burn because it doesn't burn, it used nuclear fusion. so no fire there.

Answer 3

It was once believed that the sun was a huge lump of burning coal in the sky. If that was the case, it would have burned out a long time ago. The sun is actually nuclear fusion. The sun is made up of primarily Hydrogen (Protons) and Helium. When two protons collide, with the correct amount of force, in the suns core, they combine to form a proton-neutron pair. The pair will emit a neutrino and a positron. The proton-neutron pair will then join with another proton to form a light helium. The light helium then collides with another light helium to form a stable helium. The two extra protons escape. The helium has slightly smaller mass than the four protons had. This loss of mass is where the huge amount of energy comes from.

Answer 4

The sun is not on fire. Fusion at the centre produces energy that keeps the centre at millions of degrees. The heat makes its way to the surface which is kept at alomst 6000 degrees Kelvin (close to 11,000 F). The surface is so hot that it glows (but it does not burn).

Just like the filament in a light bulb gets very hot because of the electricity that goes through; however it does not burn. In fact, if you let oxyden inside the light bulb, then the filament WILL burn (the metal will oxydize) and the light bulb goes off.

Elements on an electric stove also glow from the same principle. They stay at a dull red color becasue they are not as hot as the surface of the sun.

Answer 5

The Sun is a so called black body. It looks essentially white because it is literally white hot, as all black bodies look when they are as hot as the Sun's outer layers are, which is ~5,700 degrees Kelvin. If you could heat a black Iron cannonball up to the same white hot surface temperature, it would look the same. What makes it so hot is that the Sun continually converts matter into energy by fusing Hydrogen nuclei (protons) into Helium nuclei (alpha particles), and the resultant energy released from the matter destroyed comes out as pure heat which then radiates away into empty space. This process is sufficient to keep the Sun's surface white hot for billions of years.

Answer 6

The sun is not on fire (like a campfire or a candle).
Nuclear fusion is what creates the light and heat of the sun, and nuclear fusion doesn't need oxygen.

Answer 7

You're thinking like a scientist. That's good.

The short answer is, the Sun does not need oxygen. It "burns" not by combustion but by nuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium.

Answer 8

The Sun is not on fire. It is nuclear reactions that power the Sun. Fire is a chemical reaction.

Answer 9

The sun doesn't "burn" by combustion (combing chemicals like oxygen with other chemicals).

The sun produces its light and heat by fusing hydrogen atoms together--which produces millions of times more energy.

Answer 10

The sun is not fire (combustion) it is thermonuclear fusion. This is a process that involve the nucleus of atoms (hydrogen); while combustion does affect only the valance electrons (no implication of nucleus).
Combustion is chemistry; thermonuclear fusion is physics.