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The Inner Planets Notes How Many Planets? • How many planets are there in our Solar System? 9? 8? • 13 Planets!!! – 4 terrestrial planets – 4 gas planets – 5 dwarf planets Planet Types • Terrestrial Planets – – – – “rocky planets” Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars Orbit the Sun Clear their own orbits of other objects • Dwarf Planets – – – – Made of rock and ice Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, Eris Orbit the Sun Too small to fully clear orbits, often found in Asteroid Belt or Kuiper Belt Order of the Solar System • Sun • Inner Planets – – – – Mercury Venus Earth Mars • Asteroid Belt – Asteroids – Ceres • Outer Planets • Kuiper Belt • Oort Cloud 1st Rock - Mercury • Dead planet, shrinking • Extreme temperatures • Thin atmosphere • Fast orbit, slow rotation, year shorter than day! • No moons • Smallest planet 2nd Rock - Venus • Bright in night sky • Earth’s “evil twin”, same size, same materials • Thick, deadly atmosphere, massive lightning • Heavily volcanic • Hottest planet, runaway greenhouse effect • No moons 3rd Rock - Earth • • • • One moon Only planet with life Ocean’s cover 75% of surface Study of Earth: Geology (3rd & 4th Quarter) 4th Rock - Mars • • • • The Red Planet Half the size of Earth Thin CO2 atmosphere Used to have thicker atmosphere, liquid water on surface, maybe life • Most studied and visited planet • 2 moons, Phobos & Deimos 5th Rock - Ceres • Dwarf planet • Largest object in Asteroid Belt • 1st a planet, then asteroid, now dwarf Asteroid Belt • Asteroid Belt between Mars & Jupiter • Asteroids: small, rocky objects, most under 1 km in diameter • Over 100,000 asteroids in the belt • “leftover” pieces from solar system creation • Some have large elliptical orbits that bring them closer to the Sun than the Earth, and could smash into Earth!!!