Educational Internet - resource on solar-terrestrial physics. What will the Earth be like in millions of years? What will the earth be like in 1,000,000 years?
It has long been known that this end of the world is inevitable; sooner or later, the planet may be overtaken by natural disasters that will contribute to the destruction of the Earth.
It is worth remembering that overconsumption of natural resources and global warming are relentlessly leading us towards the end of the planet's existence. Do not be upset, for the next few thousand years the planet will be relatively safe, despite climate change and the gradual displacement of continents. But still, the world population is already making forecasts about the fate of the planet, thanks to which 10 predictions about the end of the world have been formed. But today we'll talk about 10 sad facts about the future of the Earth.
Fact No. 10. New ice age in 50 thousand years
Humanity will exist for another 50 thousand years. It is unlikely that during this time humanity will die from a lack of resources or another world war. The world population expects new ice age. The last ice age ended about 15 thousand years ago!
Fact No. 9. In 100 thousand years, a supervolcano will melt everyone
According to scientists' forecasts, in 100 thousand years the Earth will suffer from a supervolcano eruption. The volcanic eruption will be so powerful that it will cover 400 cubic kilometers with magma.
There are such volcanoes in the mountains of California, but more than a million years have passed since their last eruption. It should be added that super-eruptions are very different from disasters like earthquakes, tsunamis, storms, floods and asteroid impacts - such an eruption would cause enormous harm to the entire civilization.
Fact No. 8. Meteorite fall after 500 thousand years
The biggest shock in modern history was the fall of the Tunguska meteorite in Russia, which resulted in an explosion of energy approximately 1000 times greater than that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. The diameter of the meteorite was up to 190 m in diameter. Scientists have calculated that in 500 thousand years, some space fragments measuring about 1 kilometer in diameter will fall to Earth. As a result, the Earth will be completely destroyed.
Fact No. 7. Collapse of the Grand Canyon and Arizona Crater after 2 million years
If we assume that the Earth is not touched by meteorites or supervolcanic eruptions, nothing happens during the Ice Age, then in two million years everything will collapse on its own. For example, the Grand Canyon appeared due to the erosive effects of water flowing into the Colorado River - in 2 million years there will be an increase in the level of snow and ice, which will lead to the complete destruction of the canyon. The same thing could happen to the Arizona Crater and the rocky desert badlands of South Dakota.
Fact No. 6. Flood in East Africa in 10 million years
The East African Rift tectonic plates may continue to expand. Eventually both the Somali and Nubian plates will break away completely from each other, causing a new ocean basin to divide Africa. Now the Earth is literally being torn apart - new continents and oceans are being created, which is just a cycle of development of the planet.
Fact No. 5. In 80 million years, Hawaii will be underwater
Our planet is constantly changing, and all the continents that exist today were parts of a single continent 300 million years ago. supercontinent - Pangea. Over the next 80 million years, changes to the planet will continue as Africa splits apart and a new ocean forms. Due to rising tides, volcanic activity and the Ice Age, Hawaii will be completely underwater.
The California coast will begin to sink into the ocean due to its location on the San Andreas Fault. The divided African continent will eventually collide with Europe and Asia, thereby closing the Mediterranean basin, resulting in the formation of a mountain range similar to the Himalayas.
Fact No. 4. Ozone depletion in 500 million years, mass extinction
In 500 million years there will be a surge of gamma radiation, which will cause damage to the ozone layer. Under the influence of global warming, volcanic activity, meteorite falls The ozone layer will be completely destroyed and life on Earth will end.
Fact No. 3. In 800 million years, all remaining life forms will die
A mass extinction does not mean that absolutely everything will die. From this point of view, after the human race, there will be other forms of life on Earth that will be able to adapt and will develop, despite the endless changes in the surrounding world. If they manage to cope with the influence of a supernova, which will destroy almost all life on the surface of the globe, then they will be able to survive for at least another 300 million years. After this, the level of carbon dioxide will drop to levels at which photosynthesis becomes impossible.
In 800 million years, all volcanoes will go out. Will disappear Carbon dioxide is a very important element, necessary both for plant life and for the entire atmosphere as a whole. Its disappearance will not only eliminate the possibility of the further existence of any plants, but will also lead to the disappearance of oxygen and ozone from the atmosphere, which in turn will destroy all multicellular organisms on the planet. In 800 million years, the Earth will be inhabited only by single-celled organisms..
Fact No. 2. In 2.3 billion years, the Earth's core will turn to ice
In 2.3 billion years there will be no life on the planet - everything will be destroyed, covered with magma, craters, and radiation everywhere. The planet's outer crust will freeze and stop the magnetic field, and charged particles of solar energy will destroy all remnants of our atmosphere. By that time, the temperature in the sun will increase significantly, which will lead to the complete evaporation of water from the surface of the Earth.
Fact No. 1. In 8 billion years, our planet will die when it collides with the Sun
In 8 billion years, all life on the planet will burn out under the influence of rising temperatures in the Sun. Even single-celled organisms will die, and the earth's poles will reach an average temperature of 147 degrees Celsius. Freezing the core would throw the planet out of balance, and increasing the distance to the Moon would tilt the Earth dangerously.
The surface of the Earth will resemble the surface of Venus today. When the Sun turns red and becomes 256 times larger, it will engulf the Earth.
All of the above referred to the distant future. But man is a master of harming himself, and is already capable of causing local cataclysms around himself today. Are we too arrogant to think that we can change anything and everything in the environment? The world's scientists are worried.
First, Foggy Albion will turn into snowy Albion. Then the Sahara will expand, the volcano will explode, the Mediterranean Sea will disappear and what will remain is scorched earth. We decided on the thankless task of predicting the future.
Any forecasts are approximate, just like Balzac's age. And the further they are from the present, the more inaccuracies there are. But still, even such serious people as scientists make predictions. And that's what they say.
Warmer, even warmer
Coastal residents will have a hard time, but these are just the beginnings. “Berries” can await all residents of Europe, who today are heated by the Gulf Stream, a current that “works” on the temperature difference between the equator and high latitudes. If, thanks to global warming, this difference decreases, the “hot water bottle of Europe,” according to some climate models, may turn into an ice bubble within a century—at least it will heat less, or even stop altogether. This threat especially concerns such a northern country as Great Britain, the main part of which, by all accounts, should not be warmer than in Siberia.
Africa, already today moving towards Europe, will finally close the Mediterranean Sea, forming in this place mountains of such heights that the modern Alps will seem like just a courtyard palisade
Planet fever
Global warming does not mean we are saying goodbye to ice ages. Cycles of cooling and warming on Earth occur at intervals of 100,000 to 20,000 years and are caused by changes in the parameters of the planet’s movement around the Sun, the tilt of the Earth’s axis and other complex reasons. What awaits us in the next 50,000 years?
Alaska will be connected to Russia by an ice-covered isthmus, and from the British Isles to the mainland, as thousands of years ago, it will again be possible to travel by land
First of all, fluctuations in the world's oceans. Periodic changes in temperature will cause it to fall and rise, so the continents will shrink and then grow again. In the next 20,000 years, for example, sea levels will drop and the East Coast of the United States will expand even further to the east - instead of large bays from Boston to Miami, only dry plateaus will remain. Alaska will be connected to Russia by an ice-covered isthmus, and from the British Isles to the mainland, as thousands of years ago, it will again be possible to travel by land.
If you look further into the future - 100,000 years - you can see even more changed outlines of the continents. But it's not scary. Much more serious is the threat of major volcanic eruptions. According to some theories, they occur with a frequency of approximately once every 30 million years. But one of these giant eruptions - the Taupo volcano in New Zealand, as a result of which 830 km³ of lava and ash was thrown out - occurred 26,500 years ago. The Toba volcano in Sumatra exploded even earlier - 74,000 years ago, spewing out 2,800 km³ of lava. Far away from us? Very. But it is this eruption, for a moment, that is associated with the peak of one of the ice ages and the same “bottleneck” (a decrease in the population to a critical size, close to the extinction of the species), through which our ancestors went. The thickness of the ash from the Toba volcano in Malaysia was then 9 m, and in distant India - 6 m! Oh, - in the review of “My Planet”. This photo project contains a collection of modern volcanoes.
Wind and space aliens
Stones are worn away not only by water, but also by wind. Oddly enough, in a million years it will cause the world map to be slightly different from today (the above-mentioned ocean fluctuations and continental shifts, which by that time will have shifted 45-60 km from their current location, will also contribute to this). This will especially affect the ocean shores.
For example, some volcanic islands or Calvert County in the southern part of Maryland (USA) - its rocky coastline will completely “weather” within 50,000 years. Other countries, on the contrary, will acquire new territories. Among the lucky ones is Hawaii, in the area of which there is a young active volcano that has already risen to 3000 m, although it is still hidden under water. (About how daredevils in Hawaii go for lava - in.) And in a million years there will be a full-fledged island here. They even gave him a name - Loihi (after the name of the volcano itself).
In its entire history (extremely short by geological standards), humanity has not yet encountered space aliens. But it will certainly collide
It’s not just megavolcanoes that erupt at regular intervals; scientists have calculated that once every few tens of millions of years, the Earth is bombarded by large asteroids like the one that finally destroyed the life of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. In its entire history (extremely short by geological standards), humanity has not yet encountered space aliens. But it will certainly collide. When is unknown. In 2029, the famous asteroid Apophis, 325-340 m in diameter, will deeply enter the orbit of the Moon, and on its next return it will pass even closer to Earth. And then again and again. Scientists predict that such an alien should crash into our planet in the next 50 million years. What will happen to humanity in this case is better not to know.
What does the letter L have to do with it?
In the past, continents more than once broke up and joined again, forming a single supercontinent (read about the past of the Earth and continents here -). Today, these parts of the once broken “saucer” are again striving for each other. Slowly but surely - by 2-5 cm per year. So in 20 million years, the world map will have to be redrawn - the Atlantic Ocean will become wider by several hundred kilometers, and the Pacific Ocean, on the contrary, will narrow by approximately the same distance. Australia will move north to South Asia. And in a few tens of millions of years, Africa, already today moving towards Europe, will finally close the Mediterranean Sea, forming in this place mountains of such heights that the modern Alps will seem like just a backyard palisade. The new mountain range will stretch from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. The Atlantic itself, by the way, in 100 million years will become larger than the Pacific Ocean. The formation of a supercontinent will be in full swing, but scientists do not yet know what it will look like.
There are two main versions. According to the first, the Atlantic Ocean will continue to expand, causing the Americas to collide with Asia, Australia and Antarctica. Then North America will close the Pacific Ocean and collide with Japan, and South America will be hooked, connecting with Antarctica. The continent, which stretches from east to west along the equator, is called Novopangea.
Second version: both Americas will collide with Europe and Africa, and Australia and Antarctica will collide with Southeast Asia. The result will be a supercontinent in the shape of the letter L falling backwards - Amasia.
Heatstroke
The sun is warming up. It is a fact. 4.5 billion years ago, when our planet appeared, its luminosity was 70% of today's. 2.4 billion years later - already 85%; in 1 billion years our star will become even brighter.
The oceans will begin to evaporate. Glaciers will disappear completely, the poles will turn into tropics. Life can still survive. But the merciless “Yarilo” will still not retreat - as it heats up, hydrogen will evaporate into space, drying out the Earth and turning it into a desert.
And then the reserves of hydrogen in the Sun itself will be depleted, which means that in 5 billion years it will begin to die. And it will do it beautifully - it will expand, absorbing first Mercury, then Venus, and then reach the Earth. Scientists disagree on whether it will engulf it completely or only come close to its orbit. But even in the most optimistic scenario, the star will burn our once blue planet to the ground, turning it into a firebrand, on the surface of which not only apple trees, but even mold in a jar will never bloom. But deep in the depths, microorganisms can survive for another billion years.
Materials used from Robert Hazen’s book “History of the Earth. From stardust to a living planet"
Global cataclysms, epidemics of terrible diseases, incessant wars... all this brings humanity to the point that sooner or later it may die. Having worked through this scenario in more detail, we can imagine events in which the entire population of the Earth will die out at the same time. What will the planet be like after the last representative of the human race disappears from it? Let's get a look.
Energy
Within hours of our disappearance, lights around the world will begin to go out as most power plants run on a constant supply of fossil fuels. If people don't fuel them, they will stop.
After 48 hours, low energy consumption will be noted and the nuclear power plant will automatically enter a safe mode.
Wind turbines will be able to continue operating until the lubricant runs out, but solar panels will sooner or later stop functioning due to the accumulation of dust on them.
Almost all areas except those recharging from hydroelectric dams will have power outages.
2-3 days after people disappear, most of the metro will be flooded, because there will be no one to operate the pump system.
Animals
After 10 days, pets locked at home will begin to die of hunger and thirst. Billions of chickens, cows and other livestock will die.
Some animals will be able to escape into the wild and there they will have to fight for survival.
Ornamental animals, such as cats and dogs, will not be able to survive without people and will die first.
Large dog breeds will begin to form packs, hunting small dogs or other animals. In a few weeks there will be no small dog breeds left. Many dogs that survive will interbreed with wolves.
But many animals will be happy to see people disappear. For example, the large animals of the oceans, such as whales, will flourish and their numbers will go through the roof.
Ecology
About a month after our disappearance, the water that cools all the equipment will disappear from nuclear power plants. This will cause explosions and accidents.
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It was before 1600 that anyone thought that the Sun and stars were the same type of object. We now know that the Sun is one of 100000000000 (10 11) stars in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, and there are probably at least 10 11 more galaxies in the Universe. The Sun is a medium-sized old star, about 4.5 billion years old, located at a galactic distance of 4 light years from our nearest neighboring star. Our own position in the galaxy relative to its outer edge is about 30,000 light years from the galactic center. We can consider the time of movement in the Solar orbit around the center of the galaxy with a period of about 200,000,000 years to be a Solar year. In its life, the Sun completed about 22 revolutions around the center of the galaxy. This is similar to the 22-year cycle of activity of the Sun that man observes. All this indicates that the Sun is at the beginning of its life.
Protostar.
Modern theories believe that about 5 billion years ago, the Sun began to form from a huge dark cloud of dust and steam, which included the remains of earlier exploding stars. Under the influence of gravity, the cloud began to compress and rotate. The degree of compression near the center was very large and a dense central core gradually formed. As the rotation speed increased to conserve angular momentum, the outer parts of the formation began to align. The dust and vapor particles near the outer edge of this formation were less dense and they rotated around their own center in the same direction as the parent cloud. They were doomed to become the Earth and the other planets of our solar system.
Hydrogen – combustion stage
With the onset of nuclear reactions in the core, the Sun began its life as a true star, heated not by the meager energy of gravitational collapse, but as a star with an almost inexhaustible source of nuclear fuel contained within its internal composition. This nuclear furnace maintains the Sun in a state of equilibrium, creating enough heat and pressure to withstand the crushing internal force of gravity and stop the contraction.
The Sun has remained in this stable state for the past 4.5 billion years, but what is its future? The Sun slowly becomes brighter (higher luminosity) and its rotation speed decreases. It is calculated that the young Sun had only about 70% of the brightness it now has, and its equatorial rotation period was about 9 days, rather than the 27 days it now has. The higher rotation speed likely brought greater explosive activity to its surface. The Sun appears to be calming down in its activity level, while at the same time its temperature, luminosity and size are increasing. It is predicted that in about 1.5 billion years, when the Sun is 6 billion years old, it will be almost 15% brighter than it is now. When the Sun is 10 billion years old, it will be almost twice as bright as it is now and have a radius about 40% larger.
The rise of the Red Giant.
During the first phase of stellar life, a nuclear furnace at the core fuses hydrogen nuclei into helium nuclei. In about 10 billion years, the hydrogen fuel in the core will be exhausted and the core will begin to contract again. This will cause the temperature to rise and hydrogen fusion (nuclear reaction) will begin in the shell surrounding the core. The surface layers will expand over the next 1.5 billion years until the Sun is 3 times its present size. An observer on Earth should see the Sun as a bright red disk 3 times larger than the size of the full Moon. However, the presence of such an observer on Earth is doubtful, since the energy flux on the Earth's surface will be 3 times greater than it is now, and the Earth will be 100 K hotter than at present.
The Sun will continue to expand in size and luminosity, becoming red giant star . The radius of the Sun will reach 100 real sizes, so that the planet Mercury will be absorbed by it and it will evaporate. The Sun's luminosity will be 500 times its present value, the Earth will become a sea of molten lava with a temperature of about 1700 K. The Sun will remain in this red giant stage for 250 million years (about 1 Solar year) and its core will shrink and heat up even more.
When the core temperature reaches about 100 million K, helium ash left over from earlier stages of nuclear fusion may begin to convert to carbon. This will release a huge amount of energy, which will raise the core temperature of the Sun to 300 million K. The onset of such a process will be sudden and explosive, which we call a helium flash. Approximately 1/3 of the Sun's mass will be ejected into space, forming a planetary nebula. The Sun's core will then cool to 100 million K, and then steady helium combustion will begin. By then, the Sun will be almost 10 times its present diameter and 20 times more luminous.
Dwarfs, Neutron Stars, Supernovae and Black Holes.
After the helium nuclei are converted into carbon nuclei, the Sun's mass will decrease and turn into a star, which we call a white dwarf. Until this point, almost 15 billion years will pass, and the dwarf Sun will have only 1% of its present size (about the size of the Earth), and 0.1% of its luminosity. A white dwarf made entirely of carbon cores would be extremely dense, with the sun's mass compressed into an Earth-sized sphere. The density will be about 2 x 10 9 kg/m3, which is about the same density as if a 1000 kg car were compressed to the size of a thimble. Gradually, after several billion years, the temperature and luminosity of the white dwarf will decrease and it will end its life as a cold, dark carbon fume, turning into black dwarf.
Not all stars become black dwarfs. This end of the star is predicted for small stars, with masses up to 3 solar masses; large stars will burn out relatively quickly through the fusion of hydrogen and helium. When the helium is depleted, the temperature of the core will rise high enough for the fusion of heavy elements to occur. Ultimately, in the second stage of life, the first 26 elements will be produced down to iron. But there is no way for thermonuclear fusion to produce elements heavier than iron. For this reason, the star can no longer generate energy. Without internal pressure to counteract the force of gravity, the third stage begins and eventually the electrons and protons are forced to form neutrons. The star finally stabilizes in its development and ends its life as a small neutron star with a diameter of about 16 km and a density of about a billion million g/cm2.
In large stars, the collapse of the iron-filled core happens so quickly that the star literally explodes itself as a supernova. This is the most famous grand star event. Over the course of a few days, the star releases more energy than an entire galaxy. During a supernova explosion, the temperature and pressure are so high that all elements down to uranium and plutonium are created and then ejected into space. It has been established that in the early history of the universe, many large stars became supernovae, and all known elements were synthesized. These elements were then incorporated into new generations of stars, some of which became supernovae and formed heavier elements. This process occurs repeatedly, and at the same time the concentration of heavy elements in the universe continued to increase. On the Sun we can see traces of all the elements, and it is assumed that everything heavier than iron formed first in a supernova.
During the formation of a supernova, its core is converted into a mass of neutrons. The remaining part of the neutron star, about 16 km in diameter, rotates around its own axis usually from 20 to 50 times per second. The stellar magnetic field generated by the explosion is extremely strong. Electrons spiraling toward the north and south magnetic poles of a rotating star produce radio waves in a narrow beam that are emitted from the star's magnetic poles. Since the star is spinning, this beam acts like the beam of light from a lighthouse or like the flashing light on the roof of a police car. When these pulsating radio signals were first discovered on Earth in 1960, it was thought that they might be coded signals from an intelligent life form, and these objects were amusingly called LGMs (little green men). There are now more than 500 of these rotating neutron stars, known as pulsars.
The most massive stars have strange fates. Due to the large mass and strong gravity, the final collapse of the star cannot be stopped. The star seems to collapse in on itself and form a black hole. The nature of space and time around a black hole is not fully understood, but mathematical models have been created that suggest that there are several types of black holes. So far, no black hole has been discovered experimentally. The concept of a black hole takes us back to at least 1783, when John Michel speculated about the existence of a star with such enormous gravity that no light could escape from it. Astronomers have discovered several dark regions of space from which X-rays are emitted. They think these rays are produced by electrons that are accelerated in black holes. Interesting thoughts on the topic of where matter goes after it disappears into a black hole. Some scientists hope that the black hole will fill and turn into normal matter. Other scientists suggest that black holes have another side - a white hole, through which matter spontaneously appears in space. It is possible that the black hole is a portal to another universe, or a shortcut to our own universe. There are theoretical assumptions that something similar could exist near the center of galaxies.
Most of our knowledge of stellar evolution - the birth, life and death of stars - is based on observations of the Sun. For astrophysicists, the Sun is an excellent laboratory for the detailed study of stars. But, as we have seen in the past few decades, space-based science is giving us an even more complex and mysterious picture of what is happening on the Sun. The turbulent surface atmosphere of the Sun that we observe, with its distorted and dynamic magnetic structures, is still very unpredictable. Although we know more and more about the Sun every day, there are many unanswered questions, and new ones arise all the time.
A year ago, in a speech at the Oxford University Union, the legendary Stephen Hawking said that humanity can only survive for another 1,000 years. We've compiled the most exciting predictions for the new millennium.
8 PHOTOS
1. People will live for 1000 years.
Millionaires are already investing millions of dollars into research to slow or stop aging altogether. In 1,000 years, medical engineers may develop treatments for each component that causes tissue to age. Gene editing tools are here, which could potentially control our genes and make people immune to disease.
2. People will move to another planet. In 1000 years, the only way for humanity to survive may be to create new settlements in space. SpaceX has a mission of “enabling humans to become a spacefaring civilization.” Company founder Elon Musk hopes for the first launch of his spacecraft by 2022, heading to Mars.
3. We will all look the same. In his speculative thought experiment, Dr. Kwan proposed that in the distant future (100,000 years from now), humans will develop larger foreheads, larger nostrils, larger eyes, and more pigmented skin. Scientists are already working on ways to edit genomes so parents can choose what their children will look like.
4. There will be super-fast intelligent computers. In 2014, a supercomputer performed the most accurate simulation of the human brain to date. In 1000 years, computers will predict coincidences and surpass the processing speed of the human brain.
5. People will become cyborgs. Machines can already improve human hearing and vision. Scientists and engineers are developing bionic eyes to help blind people see. In 1000 years, merging with technology may be the only way for humanity to compete with artificial intelligence.
6. Mass extinction. The last mass extinction wiped out the dinosaurs. A recent study found that the extinction rate for species in the 20th century was up to 100 times higher than it would normally be without human impact. According to some scientists, Only a gradual reduction in population can help civilization survive.
7. We will all speak the same global language. The main factor that is most likely to lead to a universal language is the ordering of languages. Linguists predict that through 90% of languages will disappear in 100 years due to migration, and the remaining ones will become simplified.
8. Nanotechnology will solve the energy and pollution crisis. In 1000 years, nanotechnology will be able to eliminate environmental damage, purify water and air, and harness the energy of the sun.
