Mean distance: 149,600,000 km
Spectral Classification: G2V
Surface Temperature: 5,778º K
Coronal Temperature: >10,000,000º K
Mainstream description
A nearly perfect spherical ball of gas composed primarily of hydrogen with small amounts of helium and trace amounts of other elements. The intense light and heat of the sun is the result of thermonuclear fusion occurring in its very dense and highly compressed core. Internal convection generates the sun’s magnetic field via a dynamo effect. The outer atmosphere, or corona, of the sun is thousands of times hotter than its surface, or photosphere. The source of this extreme heat differential is still a mystery.
Alternative description
The sun is a large sphere of plasma that is powered by electric currents that flow within our arm of the galaxy as they do throughout our entire galaxy and all other galaxies. An intense plasma discharge of these currents initiates nuclear fusion at the surface of the sun and in its outer atmosphere. This fusion process causes the flux of neutrinos emitted by the sun to vary with solar activity. It also generates heavy elements in the photosphere and corona.