Phy301A-Lecture 2:

Energy in the Biosphere

Influence of the Sun

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The Sun: its Structure
More than
99.99% of the
energy that
reaches the
biosphere
comes from
the sun. So
let us have a
closer look

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Sun’s Structure
● Sun’s energy comes from thermonuclear fusion of hydrogen
nuclei into helium.
● Sun’s structure (Radius RS = 695700 km: )
○ Core - extends from 0.2RS to 0.25RS. Fusion reactions take
place only here because of the sufficiently high pressure and
temperature (> 15MK).
○ Radiative zone - extends from core to 0.7RS. Photons diffuse
through this region and take about 100,000 years to cross it.
○ Convective zone (from 0.7RS to RS. Photons take about a
month to cross this region. Behaves as a fluid.
○ Photosphere is the visible surface with T = 5778 K. 3
More about the Sun
● The sun is almost a perfect sphere made of very hot plasma with a
radius 109 times that of the earth and a mass 330,000 that of the
earth. 99.86% of the mass of the solar system resides in the sun.
● Sun's main constituent is hydrogen making up about 75% of its
mass; helium constitutes about 23%. The heavier elements such as
oxygen, carbon, neon, iron, nitrogen, silicon,... contribute 2%.
● The sun formed about 4.5 billion years ago from the gravitational
collapse of a molecular cloud.
● It is expected to be stable for the next 4 billion years at the end of
which hydrogen fusion in its core will end. The sun would then
grow in size and become a red giant and engulf everything up to
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the orbit of the Earth!
 Sunlight
● Earth's primary source of energy is sunlight. The average
amount of energy reaching the Earth's surface from the Sun
when the Sun is at its zenith is about 0.7kW/m2 on a surface
held perpendicular to Sun’s rays.
● Sunlight at the top of Earth's atmosphere consists of (by total
energy) about 50% IR radiation, 40% visible light, and 10% UV
radiation.
● Sun produces most of its energy by nuclear fusion in the core
region (to the best of our understanding!). Most of the energy
production (> 99%) takes place through a series of steps called
the proton-proton (p-p) chain which converts 1H to 4He.
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 p-p chain reaction
From the diagram below it should be clear that the p-p fusion
into a deuteron essentially determines the rate of the chain
reaction.

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Sunlight and Life
● Wien's law tells us the wavelength at
which the Sun radiates most: λmaxT = 2.9
Spectra of sunlight
×10-3 mK
● ⇒ λmax = 5.0×10-7 m = 500 nm which is
in the green region.
● Our eyes evolved to take advantage of Human eye sensitivity
this maximum intensity!
● Puzzle: Why do the plants not make use
of the green light? In fact they scatter it.
That's why plants are green in colour. 7
Absorption spectra of chlorophyll
Solar Constant
● Consider the sun to be a black-body
● It should obey Stefan-Boltzmann law and radiate from its
surface with a power density j* = σT4
● The power emitted by the sun P = 3.85×1026 W. This
corresponds to converting 4.27 million tonnes matter to energy
per second.
● The power density at the location of the earth (solar constant)
turns out to be P/(4πR2) = 1370 W/m2 which is very close to the
value 1361 W/m2 measured using satellites in outer space.
● The power radiated by the sun has been increasing with time
to the extent of about 20% in the past 3 billion years. 8
Albedo
● reflection coefficient
● It is the ratio of reflected
radiation from a surface to
the radiation incident upon it.
● Albedo for earth is 30%.

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What happens to sun’s energy on earth?

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Temperature of the Earth
● The energy that falls on the earth does not accumulate. It goes
out as infrared and visible radiation.
● Considering the Earth to be a perfect black body sitting at a
constant temperature (TE) we can estimate its temperature
and the nature of the outgoing radiation.
● Power input = 123 PW
● Power output = 4πR2σTE4 gives TE = 255 K (= -18∘C) a
temperature low enough to freeze all life on Earth!
● The average surface temperature of the Earth is about 15∘C.
● Puzzle: What can account for this big discrepancy?
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Greenhouse
● A greenhouse allows plants to be cultivated in cold
climates in a controlled atmosphere.
● It reduces heat
loss by preventing
convection and
thus protects the
plants from
freezing.

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Greenhouse Gases
● The most important greenhouse gas on earth is H2O.
● Trace gases such as CO2 & CH4 also contribute.
● They slow down the escape of infrared radiation from Earth,
thus raising its average surface temperature by 32K from
255K to 287K.
● H2O's contribution is about 20K
out of the 32K .
● Vibrational modes of molecules
cause this effect.

Modes of vibration of a water molecule 14

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What
happens
on the
Sun?

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