The Outer Planets

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The Outer Planets
Zeus, the king of Gods
Time, the father of Zeus
Supreme God, the father of Time, the mate of Gaia
Poseidon, the God of the Sea
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and Pluto with Charon
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Characteristics

• There is a lot of water ice
• Massive cores as a result of larger spacing.
• Reducing chemistry.

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Exploration

• Pioneer 10 (72) Jupiter (73)
• Pioneer 11 (73) Jupiter (74) and Saturn (79)
• Voyager 1 (77) Jupiter (79) and Saturn (80)
• Voyager 2 (77) Jupiter (79), Saturn (81),
  Uranus (86) and Neptune (89)
• Galileo (89) Jupiter (95)
• Cassini (97) Saturn (04)

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Basic Properties of the Jovian Planets
Planet Distance Period Diameter Mass Density
Rotation
Jupiter 5.2 11.9
142800 318 1.3 9.9 Saturn 9.5 29.5
120540 95 0.7 10.7 Uranus 19.2
84.1 51200 14 1.2 17.2 Neptune
30.1 164.8 49500 17 1.6 16.1
Planet Satellites Jupiter 35 Saturn
30 Uranus 15 Neptune 8
Planet Internal Structures Jupiter H2,
metallic H2, Ice, Rock Saturn H2, metallic H2,
Ice, Rock Uranus H2, Ice, Rock Neptune H2, Ice,
Rock
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Jupiter
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Storms on Jupiter
Internal energy source -gt heated from below -gt
turbulance
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GRS with Io and Europa
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GRS
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GDS
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Neptune
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High Clouds on Neptune
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Saturn
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Uranus
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Jupiters Rings
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Rings of Saturn
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Rings of Uranus
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Neptunes Rings
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Shoemaker-Levy 9
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Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9

• Comet SL9 was discovered by Eugene and Carolyn
  Shoemaker and David Levy in 1993. Shortly after
  its discovery it was determined to be in a highly
  elliptical path near Jupiter and on a collision
  course.
• The size and mass of the original body and the
  individual fragments is estimated to be from 2 to
  10 km in diameter for the original body and 1 to
  3 km for the largest fragments.
• Between 16 July 1994 and 22 July 1994 the
  fragments impacted the upper atmosphere of
  Jupiter. This was the first time that scientists
  had an opportunity to witness the collision of
  two extraterrestrial bodies.
• The impacts were observed by virtually every
  large ground based telescope, thousands of small
  and amateur telescopes, and several spacecraft
  including HST and Galileo.
• The pictures were posted to the Net within hours
  of the impacts and caused severe overloading on
  some ftp and WWW sites.

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SL9 Approaching Jupiter
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Visible Impacts of SL9
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SL9 in ultraviolet
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Cassini Mission

• Cassini is a joint NASA/ESA project designed to
  accomplish an exploration of the Saturnian system
  with its Cassini Saturn Orbiter and Huygens Titan
  Probe. Cassini was launched 1997 Oct 15. En route
  to Saturn, Cassini will first execute two gravity
  assist flybys of Venus, then one of Earth, and
  then one of Jupiter. It will arrive at Saturn on
  2004 July 1. Near the end of this initial orbit,
  the Huygens Probe separates from the Orbiter and
  descends through the atmosphere of Titan. The
  Orbiter relays the Probe data to Earth for about
  3 hours while the Probe enters and traverses the
  cloudy atmosphere to the surface. After the
  completion of the Probe mission, the Orbiter
  continues touring the Saturnian system for three
  and a half years. Titan synchronous orbit
  trajectories will allow about 35 flybys of Titan
  and targeted flybys of Iapetus, Dione and
  Enceladus.
• The objectives of the mission are threefold
  conduct detailed studies of Saturn's atmosphere,
  rings and magnetosphere conduct close-up studies
  of Saturn's satellites, and characterize Titan's
  atmosphere and surface.
• One of the most intriguing aspects of Titan is
  the possibility that its surface may be covered
  in part with lakes of liquid hydrocarbons that
  result from photochemical processes in its upper
  atmosphere. These hydrocarbons condense to form a
  global smog layer and eventually rain down onto
  the surface. The Cassini orbiter will use onboard
  radar to peer through Titan's clouds and
  determine if there is liquid on the surface.

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Cassini Trajectory
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Cassini Around Saturn
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Cassini Spacecraft
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Cassini and Huygens
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Cassini deploying Huygens
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Cassini liftoff
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Cassini on its way
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and Pluto, the God of the Underworld
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Outer Planets
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Basic Properties of Pluto

• Distance 39.5 AU
• Period of Revolution 248.6 years
• Diameter 2310 km
• Mass 0.0025 Earth
• Density 2.1 g/cm3
• Period of Rotation 6.39 days
• Surface Nitrogen Ice
• Atmosphere N2

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HST images
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Pluto Landscape