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SOLAR SYSTEM…AND BEYOND A.S. E.1.1 – E.1.5 Monday, April 13, 2015 STRUCTURE OF OUR SOLAR SYSTEM Kepler’s 1st Law: Planets will orbit in elliptical orbits with the Sun at one of the focii Eccentricity: a measure of how elliptical an orbit is. Venus is the least eccentric planetary orbit Most of the objects in the solar system follow a nearly circular orbit—but are still ellipses Note on distances: many distances in the solar system are listed in terms of astronomical units. The average distance from the Earth to the Sun is 1 AU. See diagram of elliptical orbits on p. 488 of purple textbook… MAJOR PLANETS—A RANKING OF DIAMETER (SIZE) Planet Name Mercury (smallest) Mars Venus Earth Neptune Uranus Saturn Jupiter (Largest) DWARF PLANETS i.e. Pluto, Ceres, etc. Those objects orbiting the Sun, but that have not cleared their orbital pathway of other objects Many Kuiper Belt objects and asteroids are considered Dwarf Planets ASTEROIDS Asteroid Belt located between Mars and Jupiter In a location that theoretically could have been a planet, but… Not enough debris left in the planetary disk at that point to have gravitational force required to form planet Jupiter was “greedy” Billions of asteroids—some as small as pebbles, some 100 km + in diameter COMETS “dirty snowballs” or “snowy dirtballs” Frozen ammonia, carbon dioxide, water, methane… As they come closer to the sun, they sublimate, coma increases in diameter, and solar wind pushes much of the dust and gas in a direction pointed away from the sun Both dust tail and ion tail always point away from the sun Tails get longer as the comet gets closer to the sun Orbits are HIGHLY elliptical KUIPER BELT Outskirts of solar system—beyond Neptune Pluto is technically part of the Kuiper Belt (one of the closest objects from the Belt) Billions of Pluto-sized objects, and smaller, and some potentially bigger (not detected…yet.) 7.5 – 9.3 Billion miles from Sun OORT CLOUD Surrounds Solar System—2 parts Inner Oort Cloud disc shaped like the Kuiper Belt Outer Region is more spherical “home” of the comets 2000 – 100,000+ Earth Distances (Astronomical Units / AU) from the Sun STELLAR CLUSTERS Groups of closely-located stars that share a common origin and are held together by a mutual gravitational attraction Globular Cluster Thousands to hundreds of thousands of stars grouped together in a roughly symmetrical, spherical shape PLEIADES (“SEVEN SISTERS”) • • • Open (Galactic) Cluster Dozens to hundreds of stars grouped together Not organized in a symmetrical arrangement Pleiades is one of the most commonly recognized open clusters CONSTELLATION “groups” of stars that have been linked together by Earthbound observers in order to make “pictures” in the night sky The stars in a constellation are very rarely anywhere close to each other “BIG DIPPER” (URSA MAJOR) LIGHT YEAR A measurement of astronomical distances Equivalent to the distance that light, traveling in a vacuum, will cover in 1 Earth year (365.25 days) Conversion: How many meters is 1 ly? Conversion: How many meters is 1 AU? Conversion: How many AU is 1 ly? APPARENT MOTION OF STARS (THROUGH A NIGHT) http://kids.britannica.com/eb/art-90838/A-person-standing-on-Earth-does-not-feel-the-motion