To determine which object would best represent the Sun in John's scale model of the Solar System, we first need to understand the relative sizes of Earth, the Moon, and the Sun.
The Earth has a diameter of approximately 12,742 km, and the Moon has a diameter of about 3,474 km. This means that the diameter of the Moon is roughly 27% that of the Earth.
The diameter of the Sun is about 1,391,000 km, which is approximately 109 times the diameter of the Earth.
Since John is using a shot put with a diameter of 13 cm to represent the Earth, we can calculate the appropriate size of the Sun to keep the model to scale:
Size of the Sun in the model:
- Earth diameter in model = 13 cm
- Sun diameter scaled = 13 cm × 109 ≈ 1,417 cm.
Now, let's evaluate the options provided for objects to represent the Sun: A. Table tennis ball: 4 cm B. House: 1,400 cm C. Pool ball: 6 cm D. Soccer ball: 22 cm
Out of these options, the object that is closest to 1,417 cm is the house at 1,400 cm. Therefore:
The best object to represent the Sun would be: B. a house (1,400 cm wide).