SSC CHSL 2024 PYQ — Question 18

In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank.

The Sun is about 1.4 million kilometres (1)_____ diameter, while the Earth is about 13,000 kilometers wide. This indicates that the Sun's width would need to be filled by more than one hundred Earths. Sunspots are dreary (2)_____ on the Sun's surface that are two thousand degrees Celsius cooler than the rest of the surface. The coolest piece of the sunspot is the dim focus called the umbra. The penumbra surrounds it. On the Sun's surface, some sunspots are just specks. Additionally, they appear in groups up to ten times larger than Earth. They can sometimes reach 200,000 miles in length. As the Sun rotates, these groups (3)_____ to travel across the Sun over two weeks. Every 11 years, the number of sunspots reaches its maximum. The solar or sunspot cycle (4)______ to this. The Earth's weather may become more extreme and warm during the peak of sunspot activity. According to the (5)______ made by satellites like Nimbus 7, when sunspots are at their largest, less heat reaches Earth.