Survey
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
The Inner Planets Mercury • Closest planet to the sun • Surface has many craters and looks like the moon • Cliffs that may have formed from the iron rich core to cool and contract causing the crust to shrink • Very little gravity • Gases that could form an atmosphere easily escape • Thin atmosphere made of sodium, potassium, helium, and hydrogen • 450* C during day, -170* at night Venus • 2nd planet from the sun • Similar size and mass of the earth • Atmosphere has 90 x the pressure then the earth • Made up of mostly carbon dioxide • Clouds contain droplets of sulfuric acid, give them a yellowish look. • Solar energy is trapped by atmosphere, temp. can reach 470* C Earth • 3rd Planet from the sun • Average distance from the sun is 150 million kilometers. (93 million Miles) • Surface temp. of earth allows water to exist in all three states (solids, liquids, and gas) • • Ozone, ( O3) exists in the layer of the atmosphere known as the stratosphere • Ozone protects life from the ultraviolet radiation Mars • The fourth planet from the sun • Red planet because of the iron oxide in the rocks • Contains the largest volcano in the solar system (Olympus Mons) • Large rift, zones have formed in the Martian Crust • Has two polar ice caps that change in size – Northern pole – Water ice – South Pole – Frozen carbon dioxide • Mars is 55 million Km at the closest point to the earth (34,182,722 miles) • Would take 3 years to get to mars • Two moons – Phobos and Deimos • Long channels in the surface – Flowing water • Atmosphere is made up of Carbon Dioxide, nitrogen, argon – Much thinner then ours Outer Planets Jupiter • 5th planet from the sun • Largest planet Has a faint ring around it • Composed of mostly gases and liquid hydrogen, helium and some ammonia, methane and water vapor • Great Red Spot (large hurricane) • 28 moons – Four largest, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto – Gallileo discovered them in 1610 – Volcanoes continually erupt on Io – Ocean of liquid water is hypothesized to exist under the ice crust of Europa Saturn • • • • Sixth planet from the sun Ringed planet Second largest Has the lowest density, so low that the planet would float on water • Gaseous planet • Atmosphere composed of hydrogen and helium • Has several broad rings made of ice and rocks • At least 30 moons orbit Saturn, the largest being Titan • The environment on Titan might be similar to the environment on earth before oxygen became a major atmospheric gas Uranus • • • • Seventh planet from the sun 21 moons and additional satellites Has a system of thin, dark rings Atmosphere is composed of hydrogen, helium, and some methane gives the planet a distinctive bluish green color • Axis of rotation is tilted on its side Neptune • Is the 8th planet from the sun most of the time • Methane in its atmosphere give neptune its blue green color • Outer layer changes from gas to a slushlike layer (melted ice) towards the interior • Towards the interior, this slushy material is thought to change into a solid • Has a great dark spot • Winds in the gaseous portion exceed speeds of 2400 km per hour • Eight moons – Triton is the most unique – Has a great geyser that shoot gaseous nitrogen into space • Also has rings that are thin in some places and thick in other places Pluto • Is the farthest from the sun then any other planets during most of its orbit • Dense atmosphere, only outer planet with a solid rocky surface • Some people feel that Pluto was a moon that escaped from its orbit around Neptune • Only moon – Charon (considered the double planet) Sedna • 10 planet from the sun • It is twice as far from the sun as any other solar system object and three times farther than Pluto or Neptune. • the orbit of Sedna is extreme elliptical • it takes 10,500 years to circle the sun. • On 15 March 2004, Sedna was discovered • the surface temperature is about 400 degrees below zero Farenheit • Sedna is at most about 1800 km in diameter