## Today, our planet is at the greatest distance from the Sun, a phenomenon explained by scientists as “aphelion”

The so-called “aphelion” between Terra and the Sun will consist in a distance of 152,092,505 kilometers.

Usually, the Earth is standing at a distance of 149,597,870 kilometers from the Sun, a value known as “astronomical unit” (AU).

However, the separation between the two bodies varies over time, because the Earth’s path in the orbit is not perfectly circular.

This is why the planet reaches its aphelion in July and the perihelion in January when the Earth is closest to the Sun.

The disparity between affection and perihelion is small, about five million kilometers long.

However, this change has an impact on the Earth, because it moves faster when it is closer to the Sun.

This change causes a shorter winter in the northern hemisphere, and a longer one in the southern hemisphere writes space.com.

But the elliptical orbit of the Sun does not determine the seasons, but this is caused by the inclination of the axis of 23.5 degrees on the vertical axis.

To describe the nature of the elliptical orbit, scientists use a factor called eccentricity, which is expressed as a number from zero to one.

If the planet has eccentricity near zero, then its ellipse is circular, if the eccentricity approaches one, then the ellipse is long and slender.

The Earth has a small eccentricity of 0.2, which means it is very close to being circular, which is why the difference in distance from Sun to perihelion and aphelion is not so great.

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