The speed of light in a vacuum is exactly 299,792,458 m/s. this speed is sometimes used to provide a convenient yardstick for large astronomical distances.(c) a light-year is the distance light travels in one year. the sun is 28,000 light-years from the center of the milky way galaxy. what is this distance in meters?

Explanation:

To answer this question it is necessary to understand that Light travels in vacuum at a constant speed, which means an important property to estimate distances in Universe. We already know that speed of light in vacuum is exactly 299,792,458 m/s.

To solve this question, we need to answer these two ones:

In the first question, we need to know the distance that light travels in one year, which give us some clue to respond the distance that light travels in 28,000 light-years.

The answer to the second question it is crucial to answer the first question in meters.

.

That is, there are 31,536,000 seconds in a year.

Because light travels at a constant speed, the distance can be calculated as follows:

or, equivalently,

So,

But, we can see that these are big numbers, and a better way to deal with this is to use scientific notation or floating-point numbers.

Then,

and,

So,

, and,

Then, the total distance that light travels in a year is:

But we now that The Sun is 28,000 light-year from the center of the Milky Way galaxy, and that  28000light-year= light-year.

So, the distance in meters of The Sun from the center of the Milky Way galaxy is:

Then, the answer is:

.  

Likewise, the answer could be found as a matter of proportions, mostly because light travels the same distance at each time:

If light travels in a light-year, how many meters does light travel in 28,000 light-year?

= . or

That is, the same result.

Notice that we calculate the result using 1 year = 365days. We can add more precision to our answer if we consider 1 year = 365,25days, following the same steps.