Poll: Could a sun still burn underwater?

[thahat]

So we're going with the sun would definitely be able to withstand it and continue through its own fission and simply burn out the ocean around it... cool Would the sudden transition to steam be able to act as a massive power source?

yes, steampower style, also yes: H2o = also hydrogen molecules and air. so the sun might somehow just use it as fuel. if it ever got close enough XD

 

[deadish]

Completely ridiculous question, but I'm half sort of writing a sci-fi/fantasy series, and a set piece I always wanted to include is the fulfilment of a prophecy in which a red dwarf sun is brought into the orbit of supermassive ocean world, then dropped into the waves. My question is what would happen? Would it go out? Would it continue to burn under its own energy even for a small time? Tangentially what would the ridiculously huge amount of steam produced do to the planet at large? Obviously the science involved is not physically sound- in terms of finding a planet that big covered in water, or the ability to shift suns, so don't tell me how stupid it is I'm simply trying to comprehend what would happen if, and what a sun drowning would look like....

The sun will probably get pulled apart by the larger gravitational force of your massive water world and you end up with a layer of hydrogen on the surface of the water. You might can get a nuclear reaction on the surface though as the crazy high gravity compresses the hydrogen.

 

[Lucane]

So we're going with the sun would definitely be able to withstand it and continue through its own fission and simply burn out the ocean around it... cool Would the sudden transition to steam be able to act as a massive power source?

Wouldn't the intense light and heat from the Star it self be a better constant source of power? Provided the planet's eco system could handle such a heat source just being dropped onto it If the amount of water on the planet is beyond thousands of times the size of the planet then maybe it might not destroy the eco-system and the planet but might be able to survive in the ocean but if the water is like earths it'll be drawn toward the star's gravity field while constantly evaporating likely killing most of the relatively close sea life. Provided the core of the planet is strong enough to withstand the heat, weight, and gravity of the Star it would just rest on the ocean floor otherwise it could likely weaken the planets core and maybe destroy the planet.


Edit: Now if you wanna make like a artificial Star those can have new rules however you want while still being mostly the same like has the same light/heat but none of the mass so it doesn't have a gravity swell around it and such.

 

[Kathinka]

the bit of astronomy i had in highschool was quite a long time ago, but from what i remember no solid earth like planet could be as large as even the smallest possible star/sun. it would make the transformation to gas giant somewhere looooong before that.

 

[MorganL4]

So we're going with the sun would definitely be able to withstand it and continue through its own fission and simply burn out the ocean around it... cool Would the sudden transition to steam be able to act as a massive power source?

If you have access to a sun, why would you worry about using steam for power? I mean you have effectively harnessed the sun to where you can pull it down onto a water planet, in theory you can use it as a power source for the next 5 billion years...... But those would be some really strong radiation suits.

 

[Revnak_v1legacy]

Yes, as oxygen and hydrogen make excellent fuel for nuclear fusion. Here's a nice rule of thumb, as long as the atoms that make up the compound are smaller than iron, they make excellent star fuel. To be honest, a water world that large probably already would be a star.

 

[McMullen]

Completely ridiculous question, but I'm half sort of writing a sci-fi/fantasy series, and a set piece I always wanted to include is the fulfilment of a prophecy in which a red dwarf sun is brought into the orbit of supermassive ocean world, then dropped into the waves. My question is what would happen? Would it go out? Would it continue to burn under its own energy even for a small time? Tangentially what would the ridiculously huge amount of steam produced do to the planet at large? Obviously the science involved is not physically sound- in terms of finding a planet that big covered in water, or the ability to shift suns, so don't tell me how stupid it is I'm simply trying to comprehend what would happen if, and what a sun drowning would look like....

The following is not meant cruelly. It is me trying to help you avoid making a humiliating mistake that the internet and pop culture will mock you for.

You don't want to do this. It'd be an incredible research fail, for a long list of reasons. It's worse than anything in The Core. You would be embarrassing yourself by doing this.

The most important is this: If you have a planet made of water that's bigger than the star (which yours must be to drown the it in the ocean), it would be massive enough to fuse its hydrogen and be a much brighter, hotter star on its own. It would simply absorb the dwarf star.

Aside from that, the star's heat would evaporate any water within an area of say, oh, the orbit of Venus. Even if you could have a planet that big that wasn't a star, it would be completely evaporated before the star even got to it. If you had a ridiculous planet the size of Earth's orbit, then it would still eventually evaporate completely and add to the mass of the star, causing the star to become hotter and brighter (which again would bring about the question of why the water planet wasn't a star to begin with).

Also, I'm pretty sure that since planets are composed of matter ejected out of a star's uppermost atmosphere and layers when it begins fusing hydrogen, you can't get a planet that's bigger than its own parent star. The smaller star would have to come from outside the system. Again, this is rendered ridiculous in the first place by having such a massive planet without it being a star.

Those should be enough. It's a bad idea and you'd be doing yourself a favor by not pursuing it.

 

[Jodah]

The water, if it somehow got close enough without evaporating and blowing away (or being of such mass that the gravity turns it into a start itself), would end up being broken apart and used for the nuclear fusion of the star. A star "burns" via nuclear fusion which is caused by a combination of great pressure and heat (caused by said pressure leading to friction.)

Also, I'm pretty sure that since planets are composed of matter ejected out of a star's uppermost atmosphere and layers when it begins fusing hydrogen, you can't get a planet that's bigger than its own parent star. The smaller star would have to come from outside the system. Again, this is rendered ridiculous in the first place by having such a massive planet without it being a star.

Close. Planets and smaller stars are created from a massive star that goes Supernova. This is because Supernovas are the only method of creating atoms heavier than iron. All lighter elements (hydrogen, helium, oxygen, carbon) can be fused to make energy. Fusing iron requires more energy than is created so a star can only fuse such materials when it is dieing IE supernova.

 

[Conza]

Completely ridiculous question, but I'm half sort of writing a sci-fi/fantasy series, and a set piece I always wanted to include is the fulfilment of a prophecy in which a red dwarf sun is brought into the orbit of supermassive ocean world, then dropped into the waves. My question is what would happen? Would it go out? Would it continue to burn under its own energy even for a small time? Tangentially what would the ridiculously huge amount of steam produced do to the planet at large? Obviously the science involved is not physically sound- in terms of finding a planet that big covered in water, or the ability to shift suns, so don't tell me how stupid it is I'm simply trying to comprehend what would happen if, and what a sun drowning would look like....

Since the sun is burning in a vaccum, the fuel of itself and the explosive force fighting against the gravitational force of its own mass, there's the possibility that it could burn under water.

The only obstacle would be, the depth of the water, how long the water would last, because if there were too much applied to the sun, the increased density could outweigh the explosive force of the sun, and cause a blackhole, alternatively, if there were too little water, it wouldn't last very long, and would likely evaporate into space.

 

[Gennaroc]

Shit. Thanks so much for the awesome analysis everyone, I had no idea I'd get this amount of feedback. If I'm not too late to the party, I'l addd in a bit more info considering the large amount of responses.
The fantasy side of this series is a massive amount of interaction between man (and all various sapient life) and Gods. Very powerful physical God's that spend a lot of time waring with eachother; and all together against the oldest God in reality. this infinitely-old God is so very sick of being alive, he is planning to destroy the universe around him in a final attempt to die. The point of the star- water thingo is part of a larger prophecy -?With a flick of an eye a Moon burns,
A Sun drowns,
The Sand writhes
and a Man becomes a God? - that is engineered to temporarily make the protagonist a 'God' in order to pose a significant threat to the old suicidal God and distract him long enough for something to be done to remove him from reality. The incredible energy of a sun dying in a planet of water (held together by the gods as a sort of universal water hole) simultaneously accompanied by various other events occurring is harnessed and used to birth a new god.
There was heaps I hadn't taken into account here, ie the total obliteration of the water world- turning into supermassive amount of steam-, which has really helped me along both scientifically and visually. Thanks everyone; btw TheIronRuler, I will endeavour to get some lesbian elves in there

 

[evilneko]

Shit. Thanks so much for the awesome analysis everyone, I had no idea I'd get this amount of feedback. If I'm not too late to the party, I'l addd in a bit more info considering the large amount of responses.
The fantasy side of this series is a massive amount of interaction between man (and all various sapient life) and Gods. Very powerful physical God's that spend a lot of time waring with eachother; and all together against the oldest God in reality. this infinitely-old God is so very sick of being alive, he is planning to destroy the universe around him in a final attempt to die. The point of the star- water thingo is part of a larger prophecy -?With a flick of an eye a Moon burns,
A Sun drowns,
The Sand writhes
and a Man becomes a God? - that is engineered to temporarily make the protagonist a 'God' in order to pose a significant threat to the old suicidal God and distract him long enough for something to be done to remove him from reality. The incredible energy of a sun dying in a planet of water (held together by the gods as a sort of universal water hole) simultaneously accompanied by various other events occurring is harnessed and used to birth a new god.
There was heaps I hadn't taken into account here, ie the total obliteration of the water world- turning into supermassive amount of steam-, which has really helped me along both scientifically and visually. Thanks everyone; btw TheIronRuler, I will endeavour to get some lesbian elves in there

The lovely thing about prophecy is that it doesn't have to be literal. Your burning moon and drowning sun could in fact be an unusually low-on-the-horizon eclipse.

 

[Wintermoot]

yes,
a sun is burning based on nuclear fission not literary burning.
it would simply evaporate all the water.

 

[GeneralKrunk]

Why not have some kind of super heated metor crash into the ocean instead? It would make more sense and nobody would die, maybe, ok marginaly you would have a better chance of everything everywhere not dying. And i'm imagining it looking like a huge cylinder of steam and open space. Perhaps around the upper edge it would look like a giant circular waterfall with steam gushing out.. My brain is weird though, so pay no attention.
Edit-Disregard me entirely. Your thing is way cooler, I'd definitly read it.

 

[Talshere]

Easily, Nuclear Fusion reactions require immense heat to start and as long at they perpetuate generate the heat to self sustain providing fuel is available for consumption.

We are looking at temperatures on the order of 1 billion kelvin give or take a few orders of magnitude depending on the state of reaction, also the fuel is heavy water, aka deuterium which does occur naturally in small quantities in the ocean.


If a minute sun were to spawn in the ocean now the surrounding water would instantly enter the highest energy state of matter, plasma, thus freeing electrons of their bonds. For comparison, you only need to heat water up to about 12000 degrees kelvin to cause it to become plasma.

 

[Twilight_guy]

The intense heat would turn the water into steam and then plasma which would be sucked into the sun and then probably be used in fusion. The sun isn't really "burning" in any sense of the word as it is under going fusion not combustion. The planet would most likely be pulled into the sun as it approached and either it would be reduce to plasma and absorbed or it would disrupt the sun in some way before the sun eventually returned to its normal activity of fusion (which is a result of the intense mass of the sun which the absorbed planet would only increase, thus making the sun bigger and hotter.) In short, the sun would simply absorb the planet and you'd get a bigger sun, it wouldn't "go out".

 

[lukey94]

The star could be 'born' in the water, at a massive depth the pressure would be high enough to start fusion, but like everyone has said, the star would not be able to approach the water, it would boil and evaporate in seconds, thousands of miles from the star. The star would not go out because of water, it's an explosive release of energy as nuclei combine, it's not a combustion. But there would be no water left by the time the star and planet reach.

A giant meteor could be a more likely scenario, if the meteor is the size of say Mercury, and the planets atmosphere was incredibly thin (don't know what the opposite of dense would be) then it would be a similar scenario to a star crashing into the planet

 

[Amaury_games]

First, let me say to count one less from the "No" pile. I missclicked, as I was thinking of "Such thing wouldn't be possible" and went for the negative answer. Yes, I do feel like an idiot now.

Wouldn't the water evaporate even before the sun got close enough to touch it. As I believe the sun is more like nuclear reactions than a camp fire. Not sure about the steam. Perhaps the planet would resemble a comet's tail as the planet shrinks due to massive water loss.

Also the bigger issue is about the sun's gravitational pull. It would destroy the planet before it could be pulled into the sun. If it was, it would probably show up as a solar flare. The planet couldn't be larger than the sun as the immense gravitational pressure will turn it into a sun. Though I adore astronomy (I'm fascinated by the life cycles of stars and the variations like pulsars and other neat stuff), my forte is history so I can't speak in greater depth about all this.

This. I wan't certain, but it seems more likely that planets that would be bigger than stars couldn't exist or something like that, although I don't know enough of the impact gravitational pressure has on the object that generates it, a massive force like that could start a nuclear reaction. I mean, our sun is not that large a star and its gravitational field influences things even trillions of miles away from it. That's an insane amount of distance and thus, an insane amount of force is necessary for it to have an impact on things so far away.

I think the water would be pulled to the sun as it approaches and then turned to steam as it got close (but wouldn't nearly get close enough to the surface of the sun itself. Also, the planet would burn by the high temperature and then destroyed by the gravitational field of the star.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Yes and no, the fusion that makes a star burn is going on deep inside it's core, so even if you manage to cool down the crust it would still keep boiling, it would just look like a hunk of rock.

But that's not very exciting so for the sake of sci-fi, let's say the ocean planet and the star have reached a delicate balance where the star evaporates all water on contact that then in turn holds more water back, effectively creating a steady film of vapor/gas around the star that isolates the world from eachother.
And so the sun burns red hot inside a water planet, that would be quite the visual feast.

Just don't let anyone ask about global warming...