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Filling the Solar System with AIR - What would happen? (hackertalks.com)

submitted 2 months ago by jet@hackertalks.com to c/nostupidquestions@lemmy.ca

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Let's suppose we could dump enough "breathable" air (whatever that means for humans) into the solar system that it filled the spaces between planets.

What would happen?

A - I imagine it would then become possible to fly airplanes between planets, perhaps balloons? Would space travel become easier or harder?

B - According to another lemmy post, we would start to hear sound waves from the sun (A constant jackhammer sound - delightful)

C - Each each planet become the center of some mega cyclone (like the Jupiter storms, but bigger)?

D - At some point the air above us wouldn't be pushing down onto the earth at sea level, could we survive the additional pressure?

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[–] tal@lemmy.today 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Apparently this would have about five times the mass of "Scary Barbie".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT_2021lwx

AT 2021lwx (also known as ZTF20abrbeie or "Scary Barbie"[2]) is the most energetic non-quasar optical transient astronomical event ever observed, with a peak luminosity of 7 × 10^45 erg per second (erg s−1) and a total radiated energy between 9.7 × 10^52 erg to 1.5 × 10^53 erg over three years.[2][1] Despite being lauded as the largest explosion ever, GRB 221009A was both more energetic and brighter. It was first identified in imagery obtained on 13 April 2021 by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) astronomical survey[3] and is believed to be due to the accretion of matter into a super massive black hole (SMBH) heavier than one hundred million solar masses (M☉).

Subrayan et al. originally interpreted it to be a tidal disruption event between an SMBH (~10^8 M☉) and a massive star (~14 M☉).[2] Wiseman et al. disfavor this interpretation, and instead believe the most likely scenario is "the sudden accretion of a large amount of gas, potentially a giant molecular cloud"[1] (~1,000 M☉),[6] onto an SMBH (>10^8 M☉).[1][7]

The inferred mass of the SMBH, based on the light to mass ratio, is about 1 hundred million - 1 billion solar masses, given the observed brightness. However, the theoretical limit for an accreting super massive black hole is 1 hundred million solar masses. Given the best understood model of accreting SMBH's, this even may be the most massive SMBH to possibly accrete matter.

That's maybe a hundred million solar masses, and mindbleach is figuring that we're dealing with about five hundred million solar masses.

So assuming that the gas composition isn't a factor here, I'd guess that we'd probably wind up turning ourselves into the largest explosion that humanity has ever observed in the universe, as the nitrogen undergoes gravity-induced nuclear fusion.

EDIT: Actually. Hmm. There's some portion of hydrogen gas in the atmosphere. According to this, it's mostly in water vapor. It's not much:

https://byjus.com/question-answer/what-percentage-of-the-earths-atmosphere-is-hydrogen/

The top 3 gases of the dry atmosphere are Nitrogen, Oxygen and Argon. Together they make up 99.96% of the atmosphere. All the remaining gases make up the remaining 0.04% of the atmosphere and Hydrogen is not even in the top 10. According to Wikipedia hydrogen makes up 0.000055% of the atmosphere but I wouldn't assume that it is all that accurate as it is such a small amount.

But I guess that it might be sufficient to start undergoing fusion prior to the nitrogen and blast most of the stuff apart prior to the nitrogen undergoing fusion.

Ditto for the carbon in the carbon dioxide, even if the hydrogen isn't enough.

[–] mindbleach@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 months ago

I’d guess that we’d probably wind up turning ourselves into the largest explosion that humanity has ever observed in the universe.

With front-row seats.