Unit of time in the context of "Light-year"

⭐ In the context of a light-year, a 'year' is utilized not to measure duration, but to define…

Ad spacer

>>>PUT SHARE BUTTONS HERE<<<

👉 Unit of time in the context of Light-year

A light-year, alternatively spelled light year (ly or lyr), is a unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equal to exactly 9460730472580.8 km, which is approximately 9.46 trillion km or 5.88 trillion mi. As defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a light-year is the distance that light travels in vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days). Despite its inclusion of the word "year", the term should not be misinterpreted as a unit of time.

The light-year is most often used when expressing distances to stars and other distances on a galactic scale, especially in non-specialist contexts and popular science publications. The unit most commonly used in professional astronomy is the parsec (symbol: pc, about 3.26 light-years).

↓ Explore More Topics
In this Dossier

Unit of time in the context of Year

A year is a unit of time based on how long it takes the Earth to orbit the Sun. In scientific use, the tropical year (approximately 365 solar days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45 seconds) and the sidereal year (about 20 minutes longer) are more exact. The modern calendar year, as reckoned according to the Gregorian calendar, approximates the tropical year by using a system of leap years.

The term 'year' is also used to indicate other periods of roughly similar duration, such as the lunar year (a roughly 354-day cycle of twelve of the Moon's phases – see lunar calendar), as well as periods loosely associated with the calendar or astronomical year, such as the seasonal year, the fiscal year, the academic year, etc.

↑ Return to Menu

Unit of time in the context of Million years ago

Million years ago, abbreviated as Mya, Myr (megayear), or Ma (megaannum), is a unit of time equal to 1,000,000 years (i.e. 1×10 years), or approximately 31.6 teraseconds.

↑ Return to Menu

Unit of time in the context of Frequency

Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. Frequency is an important parameter used in science and engineering to specify the rate of oscillatory and vibratory phenomena, such as mechanical vibrations, audio signals (sound), radio waves, and light.

The interval of time between events is called the period. It is the reciprocal of the frequency. For example, if a heart beats at a frequency of 120 times per minute (2 hertz), its period is one half of a second.

↑ Return to Menu