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Astronomical Numbers: How Big Is Big?
She should look surprised.
Four short stories that you may find interesting and educational.
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Astronomers use enormous numbers.
The most distant galaxies ever observed emitted their light over 13 billion years ago, and because the universe has expanded, they are now more than 300 sextillion kilometres away (186 sextillion miles).
That is why the speed of light is used as a measure of distance. Light travels at about 300,000 kilometres per second (186,000 miles per second), or 1,080 million kilometres per hour (671 million miles per hour).
The Sun is nearly 150 million kilometres away (93 million miles), and sunlight takes about 8 minutes 20 seconds to reach Earth.
Our nearest stellar neighbour is Proxima Centauri, part of the Alpha Centauri system, about 4.24 light-years away.
A light-year is the distance light travels in one year: about 9.46 trillion kilometres (5.88 trillion miles).
