Download The Solar System

• The Milky Way is the galaxy which is
the home of our Solar System together
with at least 200 billion other stars.
• The central region of the Milky Way, as
those of many other galaxies, is more
densely crowded with stars than the
outer region, and contains a massive
central object.
• The Sun is the most prominent feature
in our solar system. It is the largest
object and contains approximately 98%
of the total solar system mass.
• Solar energy passes through this region
on its way out from the center of the
Sun.
• As such, it circles the sun faster than all the other
planets.
• Mercury is the smallest planet it is only
slightly larger than Earth's moon.
• Amazing, as close to the sun as Mercury is,
ice may exist in its crater.
• Mercury speeds around the sun every 88
Earth days, traveling through space at nearly
112,000 miles per hour.
• Venus is the second planet from the Sun and
the sixth largest. Venus’ orbit is the most
nearly circular of that of any planet, with an
eccentricity of less than 1%.
• There are strong (350 kph) winds at the cloud
tops but winds at the surface are very slow,
no more than a few kilometers per hour.
• Earth, our home planet, is the only planet
in our solar system known to harbor life.
• Some facts are well known. For
instance, Earth is the third planet from
the sun and the fifth largest in the solar
system.
• Earth's diameter is just a few hundred
kilometers larger than that of Venus.
• Most rocks on the surface of the
Moon seem to be between 4.6 and 3
billion years old.
• The moon is 4.5 million years old.
• Member of our solar system, satellite
of earth.
• The planet probably got this name due to its
red color.
• Mars is sometimes referred to as the Red
Planet.
• The southern hemisphere of Mars is
predominantly ancient cratered highlands
somewhat similar to the moon.
• Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun
and by far the largest. Jupiter is more
than twice as massive as all the other
planets combined (the mass of Jupiter is
318 times that of Earth).
• Jupiter probably has a core of rocky
material amounting to something like
10 to 15 Earth-masses.
• Saturn is the sixth planet
from the Sun and the
second largest.
• Saturn is the only planet
you can see without a
telescope at night or day.
• Uranus is the seventh planet from the sun and the
third largest. Most of the planets spin on an axis
nearly perpendicular to the plane of the ecliptic
but Uranus' axis is almost parallel to the
ecliptic.
• Largest (by diameter). Uranus is larger in diameter
but smaller in mass than Neptune.
• Neptune is the eighth planet from the sun
the fourth largest (by diameter). Neptune
is smaller in diameter but larger in mass
than Uranus.
• Like Jupiter and Saturn, Neptune has
an internal heat source -- it radiates
more than twice as much energy as it
receives from the sun.
• The world was introduced to dwarf
planets in 2006, when petite Pluto was
stripped of its planet status and
reclassified as a dwarf planet.
• A dwarf planet hasn't "cleared the
neighborhood" around its orbit, which
means it has not become gravitationally
dominant and it shares its orbital space
with other bodies of a similar size.
• No one knows how many stars exist, but
the number would be staggering.
• Our universe likely contains more than
100 billion galaxies, and each of those
galaxies may have more than 100 billion
stars.