SOLUTION: Light travels 186,282 miles in one second. A light year is the distance light travels in one year. It is about 4.3 light years to the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, (other than ou
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Question 266494: Light travels 186,282 miles in one second. A light year is the distance light travels in one year. It is about 4.3 light years to the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, (other than our sun!)
How many miles away is Proxima Centauri?
____________miles
b)The distance from Los Angeles to New York is about 2,000 miles. If this distance is represented by the width of a grain of sand (say 1/100 of an inch) how many miles away would Proxima Centauri be?
___________miles
c) The diameter of our galaxy, the Milky Way, is about 100,000 light years. With this representation used in (b) what would the diameter of the Milky Way be (in miles under our scale)?
______________miles
d) Imagine we now represent the Milky Way by a single grain of sand. The universe is 15 billion light years across. How many feet would this correspond to? _____________ feet
Answer by CharlesG2(834) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Light travels 186,282 miles in one second. A light year is the distance light travels in one year. It is about 4.3 light years to the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, (other than our sun!)
How many miles away is Proxima Centauri?
____________miles
186,282 * miles/sec * 60 * sec/min * 60 min/hr * 24 * hrs/day * 365 * days/yr * 1 * year/light year = x * miles/light year
5,874,589,152,000 miles/light year (multiply this by 4.3 light years)
Proxima Centauri is 25,260,733,353,600 miles away
b)The distance from Los Angeles to New York is about 2,000 miles. If this distance is represented by the width of a grain of sand (say 1/100 of an inch) how many miles away would Proxima Centauri be?
___________miles
25,260,733,353,600 miles * 1/2000 * distance LANY/miles = 12,630,366,676.8 distances of LA to NY
12,630,366,676.8 distances of LA to NY * 1/100 * inches/distanceLANY
126,303,666.768 inches
126,303,666.768 inches * 1/12 * ft/in * 1/5280 * miles/ft
1993.4290840909090909090909090909 or approx. 1993.429 miles away is Proxima Centauri
c) The diameter of our galaxy, the Milky Way, is about 100,000 light years. With this representation used in (b) what would the diameter of the Milky Way be (in miles under our scale)?
______________miles
5,874,589,152,000 miles/light year
587,458,915,200,000,000 miles in 100,000 light years (divide this by 2000 to find out how many distances of LA to NY)
293,729,457,600,000 distances of LA to NY (multiply by 1/100 to find inches)
2,937,294,576,000 inches (convert to miles (* 1/12 * ft/in * 1/5280 * miles/ft))
46,358,815.909090909090909090909091 or approx 46,358,815.909 miles is diameter of Milky Way
d) Imagine we now represent the Milky Way by a single grain of sand. The universe is 15 billion light years across. How many feet would this correspond to? _____________ feet
5,874,589,152,000 miles/light year (multiply by 15 billion light years)
88,118,837,280,000,000,000,000 miles (divide this by the milky way diameter)
150000 milky way diameters (multiply this by 1/100 to find inches)
1500 inches (multiply by 1/12 to convert to feet)
125 feet would correspond to this
I think the late Carl Sagan would of been interested in this math problem.
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