Expert: Jayendra Upadhye - 4/7/2004

Question
Roughly how much raw material gets blasted out from the sun in the form of charged particles and whatnot from the solar wind?

Answer
Hi greg!
The answer is not from me but the world wide web! (sorry about that).
This mass attrition or mass loss turns out to be about "10 million tons of material per year, which may seem like a large number, but is insignificant relative to the total mass of the Sun." ...quotes mine.
The site in question is http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr162/lect/sun/wind.html
you see sometimes "self help" using the web and simple search strings is better (and quicker) help than what an expert can offer!
By the way I concentrate more on concepts and theory and try to remember as few facts (numbers) as possible as these can be referred to - as above - any time one wants.
Sort of defence against clutter i suppose.
Thanks for drawing my attention to this though as it had never crossed my mind to look into this "insignificant" detail! ;)
jayen