• Question: Do you think attoms are in the sun range because surely the sun would burn them to nothing?

    Asked by nary532prop9 on 31 Jan 2026.
    • Photo: Dimona Videnlieva

      Dimona Videnlieva answered on 31 Jan 2026:

      Atoms are tiny building blocks, like LEGO bricks, that make up everything. They are everywhere — even in the Sun!

      The Sun is very, very hot, so it gives atoms lots of energy and makes them zoom around super fast. But it doesn’t destroy them.

      It’s a bit like boiling water in a pot. When water gets hot, the tiny bits move faster and faster and can float up into the air as steam.

    • Photo: Martin McCoustra

      Martin McCoustra answered on 2 Feb 2026:

      The Sun doesn’t “burn” in the chemical sense of combustion being a rapid oxidation process where fuels are converted into carbon dioxide and water. The Sun is powered by nuclear fusion… Fusion takes light atoms and smashes them together to make heavier atoms with the release of energy (by converting mass into energy as Einstein predicted). This happens all the way up until we make iron atoms. Above iron fusion processes don’t release heat. At that point a star will start to die.

    • Photo: Martin Pike

      Martin Pike answered on 2 Feb 2026:

      In addition to what has been said, the sun (especially the corona – the outer bit) is so hot that the electrons around the nucleus get excited/gain energy and move away from the atoms. This makes a plasma – a hot gas that contains both free electrons (negative) and ions (nuclei + remaining electrons = positive charges). The high-energy electrons also jump back to be closer to the ions/nuclei. As they do so, they lose energy – this is given off as light. Amazingly, by analysing the light it is possible to learn what atoms there are in the sun – as the frequency (colour) of the light is specific to certain elements/atoms. You can do the same for distant stars, even planets – this is called spectroscopy.
      I think that is amazing.

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