THE SOLAR SYSTEM

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THE SOLAR SYSTEM
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The Solar System consists of

• Planets
• Moons
• Asteroids
• Comets

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PLANETS
A planet is a large, round heavenly body that
orbits a star and shines with light reflected
from the star. We know of eight planets that
orbit the sun in our solar system. Since 1992,
astronomers have also discovered many planets
orbiting other stars. World book
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What are the eight planets?

• HINT My Very Educated Mother Just Sent Us Nuts
• Mercury
• Venus
• Earth
• Mars
• Jupiter
• Saturn
• Uranus
• Neptune

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MERCURY
  The smallest planet in the solar system and
the one nearest to the sun. Its orbit about the
sun takes 88 days to complete, at a mean distance
of almost 36,000,000 miles. Mercury goes around
the sun about four times while the earth is going
around once. World Book
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VENUS
 Venus is the sixth largest planet in the solar
system and the second in distance from the sun.
Venus is the brightest planet in the solar system
and the one that comes closest to the earth.
World Book
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EARTH

• Age At least 4 1/2 billion years
• Mass 6,600,000,000,000,000,000,000 (6.6
  sextillion) tons (6.0 sextillion metric tons).
• Surface features Highest landMount Everest,
  29,035 feet (8,850 meters) above sea level.
  Lowest landshore of Dead Sea, about 1,310 feet
  (399 meters) below sea).
• Temperature Highest, 136 F (58 C) at Al
  Aziziyah, Libya. Lowest, -128.6 F (-89.6 C) at
  Vostok Station in Antarctica. Average surface
  temperature, 59 F (15 C).
• Chemical makeup of the earth's crust (in percent
  of the crust's weight) oxygen 46.6, silicon
  27.7, aluminum 8.1, iron 5.0, calcium 3.6, sodium
  2.8, potassium 2.6, magnesium 2.0, and other
  elements totaling 1.6.

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MARS

• The Mars Odyssey probe, shown in this
  illustration orbiting Mars, found evidence of
  water ice beneath the surface of Mars in 2002.
  The probe, launched in 2001, also analyzed the
  chemical composition of the planet's surface.
  World Book

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MARS

• It is the fourth planet from the sun.
• It is sometimes referred to as the Red Planet
• It has a diameter of 6,794 km.
• It has a very thin atmosphere mostly made of
  carbon dioxide.

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What is this planet called?
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Jupiter

• Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar
  system. Its diameter is 88,846 miles (142,984
  kilometers), more than 11 times that of Earth,
  and about one-tenth that of the sun. It would
  take more than 1,000 Earths to fill up the volume
  of the giant planet. When viewed from Earth,
  Jupiter appears brighter than most stars. It is
  usually the second brightest planetafter Venus.

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SATURN
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SATURN

• It is the sixth planet from the sun
• It is the least dense of all the planets.
• It has a diameter of 120,536 km.
• It radiates more energy into space than it
  receives from the sun.

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URANUS
one of the larger planets in the solar system and
the seventh in distance from the sun.
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URANUS

• It is the seventh planet from the sun.
• It was the first planet discovered in modern
  times.
• It has a diameter of 51,118 km.
• It is composed primarily of rocks and various
  ices.

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NEPTUNE

•  Latin , related to nebula cloud, mist

In Neptune's outermost ring, 39,000 miles
(63,000 kilometers) from the planet, material
mysteriously clumps into three bright, dense
arcs.NASA
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NEPTUNE

• It is the eighth planet from the sun.
• It has a diameter of 49,532 km.
• It is mostly composed of various ices.
• It is blue because of its absorption of red
  light by methane in the atmosphere.

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What Happened to Pluto???
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PLUTO
Is Pluto a planet?
Once known as the smallest, coldest, and most
distant planet from the Sun, Pluto has a dual
identity, not to mention being enshrouded in
controversy since its discovery in 1930.
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Pluto ????

• On August 24, 2006, the International
  Astronomical Union (IAU) formally downgraded
  Pluto from an official planet to a dwarf planet.
  According to the new rules a planet meets three
  criteria
• it must orbit the Sun,
• it must be big enough for gravity to squash it
  into a round ball,
• it must have cleared other things out of the way
  in its orbital neighborhood.

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Pluto

• The latter measure knocks out Pluto!

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AND MUCH MUCH MORE.
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Asteroids

• What is an Asteroid?
• Small rocky bodies that have been compared to
  flying mountains
• Ceres is the largest (_at_ 1000 km in diameter) and
  first to be discovered

Asteroids show up as streaks on photos.
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Asteroid Facts

• About 100 have a diameter over 100 km
• Some reflect light well, others are black as coal
• Asteroids tumble as they orbit the sun

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Examples of Asteroids
Asteroid Belt
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Asteroid Belt
The asteroid belt is located between Mars and
Jupiter
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Comets
Pieces of rocky and metallic materials held
together by frozen gases, such as water, ammonia,
methane, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide.
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Halleys Comet

• In 1704 Sir Edmond Halley hypothesized that the
  comets of 1456, 1532, 1607, 1682 were the same
  object.
• He calculated a 75.7 year orbit and predicted
  that it would return in 1758.
• Halley died but comet returned.

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Halleys Comet will return in 2061.
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Comets are dirty ice balls!

• Nucleus - rock ices (mostly H2O and CO2 dry
  ice, some methane CH4 ammonia NH3)
• Coma is gaseous. As comet approaches Sun ices
  sublime, change from solid to gas, dust grains
  loosen and move away
• Tails - solar wind (steady stream of solar
  particles) pushes gas away dust continues to
  orbit Sun

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Meteors

• Meteors are bright streaks of light in the sky
• longer streaks are called
• meteor trails
• Meteor showers come at
• certain times of the year
• from the same known parts
• of the sky

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• The cause of meteors is meteoroids, grains of
• matter burning up in the atmosphere. An
• estimated 1000 tons falls on the Earth daily
• Material comes from asteroid collisions and
• comet tails

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The projectile that exploded on impact and
produced Meteor Crater was equivalent to the
energy of 1000 Hiroshima bombs. 20 megatons!

• Most famous crater is Meteor Crater near
  Flagstaff in Arizona. More than 1 km in diameter
  and 180 m deep, it resulted from a meteorite
  about 45 m across
• Dinosaur extinction is believed to have been
  caused by a meteor _at_ 10 km across?