Download Study Guide 24-4 – Other Objects in the Solar System

1
Study Guide 24-4 – Other Objects in the Solar System
(Comets, Meteoroids, and asteroids)
Ms. Grady
What are the other objects in the Solar System besides planets?
1. Meteorites
2. Meteoroids
3. Asteroids
4. Stars
5. Comets
Comet is made up of dust + rock particles + ice (frozen water, methane,
ammonia) orbiting the sun.
The core of a comet is
The cloud of dust
Nucleus (core) + coma
called the nucleus.→
surrounding the
(cloud of dust forming
nucleus is called the the nucleus) forms
coma.→
the head.
Solar wind of the sun blows
the coma outward into a
long tail.
 Tail away from the
sun
When a comet gets
closer to the Sun or
approaches the
Sun, it begins to
melt from the heat
of the Sun.
 When a comet
melts, some of
the rocks fall
into space and
become
meteoroids.
Most of 100,000
comets in the Solar
System orbit over and
over.
 Halley’s comet
returns every 75-79
years
 Some take
thousands of years
2
Oort Cloud = spherical cloud of comets about 50,000 AU
(astronomical units) from the Sun
 Sometimes the comets in the Oort Cloud are pulled toward the
Sun.
 As they near the sun, they begin to melt which forms a cloud
around its core.
Kuiper Belt
Kuiper Belt – part of the Solar System extending from 30 – 55 AU
 It is composed of (made up of) small bodies of rock, metal, and ice.
3
Meteroids – pieces of comets leftover or broken asteroids
When the meteoroids fall into our
atmosphere and rub against the
gases, friction causes it to burn,
which produces a streak of light
known as a meteor or shooting
star.→
Meteriods fall + rub against gases
→friction causes it to burn
→produces a streak of light called a
meteor or shooting star.
Those that strike the earth are
called meteorites.→
Meteorites are big enough not to be
burned up and sometimes rocks hit
the Earth which can leave craters.
←Example,
Barringer Crater in Arizona
4
Most asteroids are located in an
area between the orbits of Mars and
Jupiter. This is known as the
Asteroid Belt →
 Why are they located there?
Jupiter’s gravity might have kept
a planet from forming in the area
where the asteroid belt is
located.
The Near Earth Asteroid
The data showed that Eros has
Rendezvous (Near) occurred in 2000
many craters and is similar to
when a spacecraft went into orbit
Meteorites on Earth.
around the asteroid 433 Eros and
gathered data.→
In 2005, the Japanese probe,
‘Haryabusa’ collected samples.
 Scientists study space objects (comets, asteroids and meteorites) to
learn what the solar system might have been like long ago and to understand
how the Earth formed.