Download 17.4 NOTES What are the other moons in the solar system

17.4 NOTES
What are the other moons in the solar system?
Objective: Compare the moons of the different planets in the solar system
A satellite is any natural or artificial object that orbits another object in space. In
1610, Galileo discovered four moons of Jupiter. Today, astronomers know that six
of the planets (Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) have moons.
Even the dwarf planet Pluto has a moon.
Two space probes, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, traveled beyond the Asteroid Belt to
the outer planets. They sent back to Earth close up pictures of the many moons
that orbited Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Together, they discovered at
least 35 moons.
MOONS OF THE INNER PLANETS
Mercury- NONE
Venus- NONE
Earth- Moon
Mars- Deimos and Phobos
MOONS OF THE OUTER PLANETS
Jupiter has 28 Galilean moons. Some are rocky. Some are icy. The space probe
Galileo arrived at Jupiter in 1995 to study these moons. Jupiter’s moon
Ganymede is the largest moon in the solar system. Three of its other moons are
Callisto, Io, and Europa.
Saturn has 30 moons. Its largest moon, Titan, is the 2nd largest moon in the solar
system. The Huygens probe arrived at Titan in 2004.
Uranus has 21 known moons. Two of them are named Titania and Oberon.
Nepune has 8 moons. Its moon Triton orbits in the opposite direction from the
rest of Neptune’s moons. It has the coldest surface in the solar system, and is
covered with frozen nitrogen and methane.
Pluto has one moon, Charon. It was discovered in 1978. It is believed that Charon
is a piece of ice that was knocked off Pluto when another object collided with it.