Download The Solar System

The Planets
20-1 pgs. 538-548
IN:
What objects
make up our solar
system?
The Sun
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The sun is the
biggest, brightest,
and hottest object in
the solar system.
The sun is an ordinary
star.
The sun is made of
about 70% hydrogen
and 28% helium.
Small Rocky Worlds
Planets – the small, dense,
rocky planets of the inner solar system.
  Mercury
  Venus
  Earth
  Mars
 Terrestrial
Terrestrial Planets
Mercury
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Mercury is solid and is
covered with craters.
Mercury has almost
no atmosphere.
Has no moon.
Venus
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Venus is the sixth
largest planet. It’s
about three-fourths
the size of earth.
The surface is rocky
and very hot. The
atmosphere
completely hides the
surface and traps the
heat.
Also, has no moon.
Earth
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Earth is the fifth largest planet and the third
from the sun.
Liquid covers 71 percent of the Earth’s surface.
The Earth has one moon.
Moon
Mars
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Mars is the fourth
planet from the sun.
Mars has a thin
atmosphere that
contains mostly
carbon dioxide.
Mars has two small
moons.
Moons of Mars
Phobos
Deimos
Asteroid Belt
Big Gaseous Worlds
Giants – the large, gaseous
planets of the outer solar system.
  Jupiter
  Saturn
  Uranus
  Neptune
 Gas
– All gas giants have rings!
Gas Giants
Jupiter
Jupiter’s Red Spot
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The Great Red Spot, a huge storm of swirling
gas that has lasted for hundreds of years.
Jupiter does not have a solid surface. The
planet is a ball of liquid surrounded by gas.
Moons of Jupiter
Jupiter has four large Galilean moons,
twelve smaller named moons and
twenty-three more recently discovered
but not named moons.
We’ll take a look at the four large
Galilean moons which were first
observed by Galileo in 1610.
Io
– Io is the fifth moon of
Jupiter. It’s the third
largest of Jupiter’s
moons.
– Io has hundreds of
volcanic calderas.
Some of the volcanoes
are active.
Europa
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Europa is the sixth of
Jupiter’s moons and is
the fourth largest.
It is slightly smaller than
the Earth’s moon.
The surface strongly
resembles images of sea
ice on Earth. There may
be a liquid water sea
under the crust.
Europa is one of the five
known moons in the solar
system to have an
atmosphere.
Ganymede
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Ganymede is the
seventh and largest of
Jupiter’s known
satellites.
Ganymede has
extensive cratering
and an icy crust.
Callisto
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Callisto is the eighth of Jupiter’s known satellites
and the second largest.
Callisto has the oldest, most cratered surface of
any body yet observed in the solar system.
Saturn
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Saturn is the second largest planet and the sixth
from the sun.
In 2004 we got images of the rings.
Rings of Saturn
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Saturn’s rings are not solid;
they consist of icy particles
that range in size from a
few centimeters to several
meters across.
The rings are very thin.
Though they’re 250,000km
or more in diameter,
they’re less than one
kilometer thick.
Uranus
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Uranus is blue-green
because of the
methane in its
atmosphere.
Its axis is tilted 90o.
Neptune
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Neptune is the fourth
largest planet and the
eight from the sun.
Like Uranus, the
methane gives
Neptune its color.
Pluto
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Pluto – doesn’t fit either category. Pluto is a
small icy world clearly different from either
the Terrestrial and Gas Giant worlds.
Dwarf Planets
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Ceres – discovered on January 1, 1801, 45 years before
Neptune. Considered a planet for half a century before
reclassification as an asteroid. Accepted as a dwarf planet
by the IAU on September 13, 2006.
Pluto – discovered on February 18, 1930. Classified as a
planet for 76 years. Reclassified as a dwarf planet by the
IAU on August 24, 2006. Haumea – discovered on
December 28, 2004. Accepted by the IAU as a dwarf
planet on September 17, 2008.
Makemake – discovered on March 31, 2005. Accepted by
the IAU as a dwarf planet on July 11, 2008.
Eris – discovered on January 5, 2005. Called the "tenth
planet" in media reports. Accepted by the IAU as a dwarf
planet on September 13, 2006.
Kuiper Belt
OUT:
Summarize the
differences between
terrestrial planets and
gas giants.