Science




Mind Game
That’s right! It would take a beam of light 0.13 seconds to circle the Earth—no more than the blink of an eye! Our spacecraft, Seeker 2000, has blasted off from Earth and is traveling through the solar system.


QUESTION #2
The average distance from the Earth to the sun is 93 million miles. Astronomers call this distance one astronomical unit (abbreviated AU). It’s a handy yardstick for measuring distances in the solar system. Neptune is 30 AU from the sun. That’s also theaveragedistance between Neptune and Earth as the Earth goes around the sun. (To figure out how far this is in miles, multiply 30 by 93 million.)

Our spacecraft is passing Neptune. How long does a trip from the sun to Neptune take at the speed of light?

A.)25 seconds     B.)250 minutes     C.)2,790 seconds


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