What is the approximate time lag for energy created in the core to exit the Sun's radiative zone?
Answer
Hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years
Despite individual photons traveling at the speed of light, the convoluted path they must follow within the radiative zone results in an astonishingly long net travel time for the energy package itself. Because of the incessant absorption and re-emission—the random walk—the energy packet takes an immensely long time to propagate across the dense stellar interior. This sprawling, zigzagging maze means that a specific parcel of energy originating from a fusion event in the Sun's core can take several hundred thousand to millions of years before it finally escapes the radiative layer and enters the outer convection zone.
#Videos
How Do Convection And Radiation Zones Work In Stars? - YouTube
Related Questions
What mechanism defines energy transport within the stellar radiative zone?What is the process famously dubbed for energy propagation in this dense stellar layer?For our Sun, what is the inner radial boundary of the radiative zone in solar radii?How does the mechanism of energy transfer in the radiative zone contrast with the convection zone?What extreme internal property forces energy transport to rely on the slow, iterative dance of photons?What is the approximate time lag for energy created in the core to exit the Sun's radiative zone?Near the core, what is the approximate temperature reached within the radiative zone?What structural instability causes the transition from radiation to convection near the edge of the zone?What is the crucial function the radiative zone provides for long-term stellar stability?How do the radiative zones of larger, hotter stars generally compare to that of the Sun?