Here's something very interesting to consiter about our Sun's stellar evolution:
One of the processes that takes place just prior to and during ascension to a red giant is stellar mass loss. Even though the star is/is about to get bigger, it looses some mass by shedding and throwing massive sheets and streamers off of the surface. By losing mass, the strength of the gravity also decreases... when that happens the orbital tracks of the planets migrate outward.
Here's the thing, our Sun is estimated to inflate approximately in size to the current diameter of Earth's orbit. However, with stellar mass loss, Earth's orbit will migrate outward... we just don't know how much. Earth may just survive the red giant phase of our Sun.
That is cool, but probably won't matter because a processes that precedes that is stellar heating. Our sun will litterally bake the Earth and render it uninhabitable to all life long before it might engulf us.
One of the processes that takes place just prior to and during ascension to a red giant is stellar mass loss. Even though the star is/is about to get bigger, it looses some mass by shedding and throwing massive sheets and streamers off of the surface. By losing mass, the strength of the gravity also decreases... when that happens the orbital tracks of the planets migrate outward.
Here's the thing, our Sun is estimated to inflate approximately in size to the current diameter of Earth's orbit. However, with stellar mass loss, Earth's orbit will migrate outward... we just don't know how much. Earth may just survive the red giant phase of our Sun.
That is cool, but probably won't matter because a processes that precedes that is stellar heating. Our sun will litterally bake the Earth and render it uninhabitable to all life long before it might engulf us.
So there is that...
G'night kids!