Wikijunior

Solar System

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The Volunteers and Editors at
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 Introduction
General Introduction
This is a project of Wikijunior, a collection of free books written especially for kids to
learn about science and nature. Many people have been involved with writing this book.
This project is hosted on Wikibooks, and you are encouraged to help participate with
writing and editing these books.

What This Book Will Cover

There are several short articles that will cover each of the planets and many other bodies
of the Solar System. Information that will be interesting to kids will be discussed. In
addition, some general topics will be added that aren't specifically about an individual
planet or moon of the Solar System.
 Solar System
People have been watching the sky for thousands of years and wondered exactly what is
out there. With advances in telescopes as well as spaceships which have physically
traveled to various planets, a considerable amount of knowledge has been obtained to
better understand the universe near to us.
The name of our system comes from the old latin word for the Sun: Sol. Because the Sun
is the largest object in the system and all the other bodies orbit around it, it became
known as the Solar system.

What is the Solar System?

At the center of the Solar System is the Sun. This is but one of billions of stars in the sky,
but is important to us as it gives us warmth and energy for us to use. There are many
worlds that are near the Sun, each of them are as different as you can possibly imagine.
All of these worlds that either orbit the Sun or orbit a planet going around the Sun make
up what we call the Solar System. As you read each of the sections about these different
worlds, we will explore the differences between all of these worlds, and hopefully you
will understand how unique and special the Earth is as well.
There are a total of nine planets in our system. The inner-most planet is called Mercury.
This is followed by Venus and then our Earth. Beyond Earth is an orange-hued planet
called Mars. In the outer part of the system are four giant planets called Jupiter, Saturn,
Uranus, and Neptune. The outermost planet is a small world named Pluto.
Our system also includes many other bodies. The moons are small worlds that orbit the
planets, in much the same way as the planets orbit the Sun. There are also a lot of much
smaller objects called asteroids. These are big chunks of rock or metal that are mostly
found orbiting the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. We also get visitors from the cold outer
edge of our system that are called comets. These are big lumps of ice and dust. Comets
can form immense tails when they come close to the Sun and start to melt.
The solar wind is a hot gas that erupts from the sun and flies away into space. This gas
travels past the planets into outer space. The place where this gas reaches the very thin
gas between the stars is at the edge of the solar system. This bubble of gas is about 100
times as far from us as the Earth is from the Sun. Beyond that is a lot of empty space. The
nearest star to the Sun is thousands of times further away than the size of the entire Solar
System. It's a very, very big universe out there.

Who discovered it?

Prior to 1781, there were only seven known bodies in our solar system, besides the Earth.
These seven were the Sun, our Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. These
had been known since humans first began to observe the sky at night. There were also
visitors called comets that would appeared in the sky for a time, then fade away.
The Babylonians believed that each of these objects was related to a different deity, and
their calendar used a seven-day week. The practice of naming the seven visible objects of
the solar system still continues to this day. Each of the English words for the day of the
week comes from an old name for a god or goddess.

Weekday Object
Sunday Sun
Monday Moon
Tuesday Mars
Wednesday Mercury
Thursday Jupiter
Friday Venus
Saturday Saturn

Galileo Galilei first turned a telescope on the sky and began to write down what he saw.
Among the things he saw were four moons orbiting Jupiter. As time passed and the
telescope was improved, more objects were found. In 1655, Christiaan Huygens
discovered the moon Titan orbiting Saturn. In 1781 Sir William Herschel discovered the
planet Uranus. In 1801, Giuseppe Piazzi discovered the first asteroid. Many more
asteroids were later discovered by astronomers.
The discovery of the planet Neptune did not come by chance, but was found using math.
Astronomers had made tables of where each body should appear in the future. But Uranus
did not match the predictions. So a model was made to account for the difference. This
model predicted that the gravity from an unknown planet was pulling on Uranus. The
model also predicted about where the mystery planet would be found. This planet was
then found in 1846.
The last planet Pluto was later found in 1930 using the same method.

How was it formed?

Our Solar System is part of a much larger system called the Milky Way. This is a vast
mix of dust, gas, stars, and other objects that is called a galaxy. Our galaxy rotates about
the center, and if you could see it from a long, long way off it would look like a wispy
pin-wheel.
Within our Milky Way galaxy are clouds of dust and gas where stars are born. Our Solar
System was created in just such a cloud. A part of this cloud began to collapse under the
pull of its own gravity. As it got smaller, it formed a big, spinning disk of gas and tiny
particles of dust. This disk was thickest at the middle, and this part slowly collapsed to
form the early Sun.
The remainder of the disk continued to rotate about the Sun in the center. The tiny
particles of dust were now close enough so that they would often collide, and some of
these would stick together. The bits of dust would slowly collect to form grains. These
would in turn join to form lumps the size of gravel, then pebbles.
As the objects grew in size, a few grew larger than the rest and began to pull on the other
rocks with their gravity. The rocks grew ever bigger, reaching the size of mountains
which crashed together with powerful force. In the end there were only a few massive
bodies left, which swept up the rest of the disk to form the planets, moons, and asteroids.
While this was going on, the Sun began to glow from the huge energy released by its own
collapse. The temperature at the center of the Sun reached a million degrees, and it turned
into a furnace that could create more energy by smashing tiny atoms together. This energy
rose up to the surface and was emitted as light, heat, and other forms.
This energy being emitted by the Sun swept away any surviving tiny particles and gas
from the inner Solar System, leaving behind only the larger objects.

What will happen to it?

About four thousand million years from now, the Sun will have used up most of fuel. It
will begin to enter the final stages of its life. It will expand into a huge star called a
Supergiant. The size of this star will be so big that several of its planets will be inside,
including the Earth. These planets will be burnt to a crisp inside the very hot atmosphere.
Eventually the sun will begin to throw off its outer atmosphere, forming an immense
sphere of faintly glowing gas that astronomers call a planetary nebula. The sun will then
shrink down into a small star called a white dwarf. This will be about 100 times as small
as the current sun we see. It will then slowly begin to cool and grow ever fainter over
time.
 The Sun
The Sun is a large ball of very hot gas, mostly
hydrogen and helium. It is the power house of the Sun Facts:
Solar System. It's our nearest star. Scientists can • The Sun is really a star.
tell what is going on inside a star from its color. • If the Sun blew up, it would
Without the sun there would be no life on Earth. take about 8 minutes before
We depend on the sun for energy. anyone noticed.
• It produces light and heat
energy needed for life.
• Every second, over 4 million
tons of material is converted
into energy through nuclear
fusion.
• The equator of the sun rotates
much faster than areas closer
to the solar "poles".
• Never look directly at the
sun without filters. A passing
glance will cause temporary
blindness, and looking at the
sun without special filters in a
This picture was taken with a special filter that telescope will cause
shows the complex magnetic fields generated by permanent blindness in your
the sun. The loops of gas extending out from the eyes.
sun are called prominences.

How big is the sun?

The Sun is very big - much, MUCH bigger than the Earth! It is 1,392,000 km or 109
Earths across and contains more than 99.9% of the solar system's mass. If you could
somehow stand on the surface of the Sun, you would weigh 28 times as much. A grown
person would weigh as much as a car.
More than a million Earths could fit into the volume of the sun! It doesn't look that big
from where we stand, though. That's because the sun is about 150,000,000 km away. At
that distance, it takes light from the sun over eight minutes to reach the Earth. Compared
to other stars, the sun is about average-sized.

What happens inside the sun?

The sun is the main source of energy for the earth. This energy is released deep within the
sun in a process called atomic fusion. Four hydrogen atoms are fused together to make
one helium atom. The helium atom has slightly less mass than the four hydrogen atoms;
the extra mass is converted to energy. This is the same way energy is released in a nuclear
bomb called a hydrogen bomb. The diagram below shows what scientists think is going
on inside the Sun. The colours are to show the different regions.

Core: The center of the Sun is very dense. It's about 12 times as dense as lead. It's also
very hot - about 15 million °C. This region is where most of the nuclear reactions are
taking place.
Radiation Zone: In this zone the light, heat, and X-rays produced in the core fight their
way out towards the surface. The gases that make up the zone are still very dense and
keep absorbing and emitting the rays. Have you ever tried to run through water? That's
what it's like for light waves in this region of the sun. It can take a single ray of light a
million years to make its way out of this zone.
Convection zone: Have you ever seen the air shimmer above a fire? Perhaps you've been
told it's because "heat rises"? Well actually heat doesn't rise all by itself. It is the hot air
that is rising. Hot gases tend to rise, cold gases tend to sink. In this outer region of the sun
the gases are less dense and so behave more like ordinary gases that we see on Earth. At
the bottom of the convection zone the gas gets heated up by the energy that is coming
through the radiation zone from the core. This gas rises up to the surface of the sun where
it gives up its heat and cools down. The now cold gas then sinks back down. The plumes
of rising hot gas and sinking cool gas together form huge ribbons of circulating gas
known as "convection cells".
What are sunspots?

The dark areas are called sunspots.

Sunspots are slightly cooler areas on the surface of the sun that appear as dark areas. They
only appear dark against the brightness of the rest of the surface of the sun. Despite their
appearance, they are still extremely bright — brighter than an electric arc. The number of
sunspots seen rises and falls over an 11 year cycle.
Sunspots appear when the Sun's magnetic field is concentrated, impeding the flow of
energy. A typical sunspot consists of a dark region, called the Umbra, surrounded by a
lighter region, called the Penumbra. The Umbra is about 2000 °C (3600 °F) cooler than
the photosphere and only looks dark in relation to its surroundings. Spots usually form in
groups which are carried across the solar disk by the Sun's rotation.
Over a period of about 11 years, sunspot numbers increase before decreasing slowly. This
sunspot cycle happens at about the same time as the increase and decrease in the Sun's
overall activity.
The most complex sunspots are hubs of intense magnetic fields. These active regions can
suddenly erupt as flares that are short-lived, extremely bright areas that release large
amounts of charged particles and radiation. Flares are more prevalent during peaks in
solar activity.

What is the solar atmosphere like?

The part of the sun that you see in the sky is called the photosphere. This is where the
pressure from the gases inside the sun is low enough that they no longer glow so bright,
and is generally considered the "surface" of the sun. Everything that is below the
photosphere gives off light. The photosphere is also the very top of the convective zone
of the sun. It is on the photosphere that you see sunspots.
While you can say that the atmosphere of the sun begins at the photosphere, in reality the
entire sun is one very large ball of gases, where there is no definite beginning or end to
the gases from the Sun. Because the Sun is so hot, gases from the sun are constantly
streaming outward and form various parts of the solar atmosphere, which extends beyond
even the orbit of Pluto. These gases near the Earth are very thin, with so little in the way
of gas pressure that you can basically call it a vacuum, but it still is enough that it pushes
away gases from other stars in our galaxy. It is only until you get to the heliopause that
you can say that the influence of the Sun's atmosphere ends.
Various parts of the solar atmosphere are as follows:

A closeup view of a sunspot and prominences from the TRACE spacecraft

Prominences and Solar Flares

When you look at the sun through a telescope (with special filters so you eyes don't get
damaged!), at the sides of the photosphere there appear to be large eruptions of gases like
it was from a volcano. Each of these is called a prominence. There have been several
kinds of prominences, but all of them are very large. Ones you can see are hundreds of
kilometers long, and the largest was almost 400,000 kilometers. That is almost twice as
far as the moon is from the Earth. These prominences are related to sunspots, because
they are often seen as coming from a sunspot. The largest of these prominences
sometimes become so large that they leave the sun entirely, and that is when they become
a solar flare.

Chromosphere

When early astronomers viewed the sun during an eclipse, they noticed that there was a
brief flash of light immediately before and after the eclipse. Instead of being a steady
white light, it seemed to be a rainbow spectrum of all of the colors you can see, which is
what gives the chromosphere its name. It is not as bright as the photosphere, which is
why you normally don't see it during the day, but only during an eclipse.
Corona

Solar Corona during an eclipse in 1999

Even more faint than the photosphere or chromosphere is the corona. This is a region
extending from the chromosphere and gradually becoming a part of the solar wind
throughout the rest of the solar system. The reason why the corona glows is because the
gases in the corona are actually hotter than the surface of the Sun! The reason why this
happens is still a mystery to scientists, but there are several theories for what is
happening. The corona will shift and change, sometimes very rapidly over minutes or
hours, due to changes from the sun itself. Because the photosphere is so bright, it is
difficult to observe the corona except during an eclipse even with advanced scientific
instruments. Some telescopes in space are making it easier to observe the corona, but it is
still something that scientists are trying to understand.

Solar Wind

As the corona gets further from the sun, it is still "blowing" against all of the planets in
the solar system. This is called the solar wind. While the gas pressure is very low, it still
is enough that some very light objects and other gases are pushed away with the solar
wind. For other astronomical object, this is visible with the two comet "tails", where one
"tail" is mainly rocks and dust, with the other "tail" composed of gases. This second tail is
being pushed by the solar wind and causes its effect.
In 1960, the Satellite Echo I entered orbit and was one of the largest satellites ever put
into space, in terms of volume. Basically it was a large ballon that was inflated by a small
amount of gases inside. Because it was so light but also very large, its orbit was
substantially affected by the solar wind and other solar pressures. Even more compact
satellites still have to take solar wind into account when planning orbits and how long a
satellite will stay in orbit.
In the future, solar sails will use the solar wind and light pressure in order to travel
between planets, where spaceships use sails instead of just using rocket engines.
Zodiacial Light with an Aurora

Zodiacial Light

If you travel to a place very far away from any cities and look up at the night sky, a very
faint glow will come from a band across the sky in roughly the same part of the sky that
you see the other planets. This is not the Milky Way, which is also visible, but even more
faint than that. This is actually sunlight which is reflected off of dust and meteoroids that
are found throughout the ecliptic plane. This dust is the remains of comets and asteroids
colliding with each other and eventually falls into the sun over millions of years.

A diagram of where the heliopause is located

Heliopause

The Heliopause is what can largely be considered the edge of the solar system. This is
where the solar wind slows down and stops (or "pause") due to the "solar wind" coming
from other stars in the galaxy. There is a region just inside the heliopause where the solar
wind slows down from supersonic speeds (litterally, faster than sound) to subsonic
speeds. This creates a slight jolt in the electrical systems of spaceships that was detected
by the Voyager I spaceship in May 2005, which was the first man-made object to ever
travel this far from the Sun. Since this is so far from the Sun, this is a part of astronomy
that scientists are still trying to study and there is much more that needs to be learned
about this part of the solar system.

What is solar weather?

Solar weather is a new science, but something that has a huge impact on a number of
things here on the Earth. When a solar flare is produced on the sun, it includes a large
amount of plasma, or very hot gases. If this flare then heads toward the Earth, it will
cause a number of problems, including blackouts on electrical power systems in large
cities, communications disruptions with radio transmitters and satellites, and potentially
even death if an astronaut is caught unprotected when a large solar storm comes from
that flare. Normally the Earth's atmosphere protects you and I from direct effects of these
flares.
These solar flares also cause something called an aurora. This is also known as the
"Northern Lights" or "Southern Lights" (depending if you are closer to the north or the
south pole) where the plasma interacts with the atmosphere of the Earth and the Earth's
magnetic field. Normally you can only see this event when you are close to one of the
poles, but sometimes a very powerful solar flare will produce an aurora that can be seen
as far south as Mexico, or as far north as Southern Brazil, or South Africa.
The aurora is not unique to the Earth either. Aurora have been seen on all of the planets
except for Mercury and Pluto by telescopes and space probes. The aurora on Pluto have
not been seen because it is so far away and no space probes have ever been there, and
Mercury doesn't have an atmosphere (that is substantial).
Just like there are weather forecasts for weather on the Earth, there are weather
forecasters that study solar weather and try to predict when solar storms will come. Not
only do they study just what will happen near the Earth, but they also try to predict what
is going to happen in other parts of the solar system as well. As more space missions go
into other parts of the solar system, this will become even more important. To help make
the predictions, they also study the sun itself, and try to determine in advance when a
solar flare will occur.
 Mercury

Mercury Facts:
• Mercury orbits the sun faster
than any other planet.
• Mercury's surface temperature
can vary from -300° F (-180°
C) to 800° F (430°C).
• Radar observations suggest
that there is frozen water on
Mercury's north pole.

Mercury from Mariner 10

Mercury is the closest planet to the sun. It is a terrestrial planet and the second smallest
planet after Pluto. Only one spacecraft has flown by Mercury, Mariner 10, which was
launched by the U.S. on November 3, 1973. Much of what we know about this planet
came from this mission.

How big is Mercury?

Comparison of the size of Mercury to the Earth

Mercury is about 4879 km in diameter, which makes it a little over a third as big as the
Earth is across. It's small enough that eighteen balls of modeling clay the size of Mercury
could be rolled together to make one the size of Earth. In fact, the diameter of Mercury is
only about one and a half times the diameter of our moon. It is the second smallest planet
in the Solar System, just larger than Pluto. The small size and how close it is to the Sun
sometimes make it difficult to observe Mercury in the sky, especially without a telescope
or binoculars.
What is its surface like?

View of the surface of Mercury

Mercury has craters like those on the Earth's moon. They were made when asteroids or
comets crashed into the surface. The largest crater we've seen on Mercury is the Caloris
Basin. It is about 1350 km in diameter and was caused when a huge asteroid, probably
about 100 km wide, hit Mercury about 4 billion years ago.
The surface also has big cliffs called scarps. They were made long ago when Mercury
cooled down and shrank. This shrinking caused the surface to get wrinkled in some
places, which created the scarps.
There are also plains. Some of them may have been made by lava flows long ago.
There may also be water ice on both of Mercury's poles. The poles, like Earth's, get very
little warmth from the Sun, so the ice doesn't melt or evaporate.
It gets very hot during the day and very cold at night on Mercury. It's so hot during the
day (430°C, hot enough to melt tin!) because Mercury is so close to the sun. At night,
however, it gets down to -180°C, much colder than Antarctica in winter. It loses almost
all of its heat during the night because Mercury has very little atmosphere, which would
normally help to keep in the warmth.

What is its moon like?

Mercury does not have a moon. Mercury's rotation is so slow that if Mercury had a moon,
it would crash into Mercury or get broken up. This would happen because the moon's
gravity would cause tidal effects on Mercury. There would be two bulges called tidal
bulges on Mercury. One would bulge toward the moon, with the other bulge being on the
opposite side of Mercury. The moon's motion in its orbit would be faster than Mercury's
rotation because Mercury's rotation is very slow. That would cause the moon to be ahead
of the tidal bulge all the time. The gravity from the bulge would pull back on the moon.
This would cause the moon to become closer to Mercury and Mercury's rotation to speed
up. This would continue to happen over millions of years until the moon got broken up by
Mercury's gravity or crashed onto Mercury. Mercury had existed for billions of years, so
if it had any moon, it is long gone.

How long is a day on this planet?

Mercury rotates much slower than Earth. Its day is 58.6 Earth days long.

How long is a year on this planet?

Mercury is the planet with the shortest year in the solar system. It is about 88 Earth days
long, roughly one quarter of an Earth year. This means that an eight-year-old person
would be 32 years old on Mercury. One interesting thing about Mercury is that there are
three Mercury days for every two Mercury years.

What is it made of?

Mercury has a large iron core for a planet of its size. The planet contains a larger portion
of iron than any other planet in the solar system. The outer layer of the planet is made of
silicates, which are ordinary rocks.

How much would Mercury's gravity pull on me?

If you were on Mercury, it would pull you down with a force about one third as strong as
the force of Earth's gravity.

Who is it named after?

Mythology
Not only was Mercury the messenger of the
gods, he was also the god of buying and
selling. His name probably comes from the
Latin word mercator, which means
"merchant."
Mercury had his own day of the week, dies
mercuri, or "Mercury's Day". In France it is
mercredi. In English we named this day after
a Norse god, Woden, making it "Woden's
Artistic depiction of Mercury Day", or Wednesday.

In Roman mythology, Mercury was the messenger of the gods. He wore a hat and sandles
with wings on them, allowing him to travel around the world extremely quickly. The
planet Mercury was named after him because it orbits around the sun faster than any other
planet in the Solar System, traveling nearly 50 km every second!
Venus

Venus Facts:
• Venera 7, the first space probe
to land on Venus, was put out
of action by the hostile
conditions on Venus after
only 23 minutes.
• With a few exceptions, the
surface features on Venus are
all named after women.
• A day on Venus is longer than
a year there.
Venus (in the visual spectrum).
Venus is the second closest planet to the sun, and was named after the Roman goddess
called Venus. It is in a category called terrestrial planets, this means that it is very
similar in size and was created close to the same way as our planet Earth. In fact,
sometimes it is called Earth's "sister planet" as they are somewhat alike in both size and
roughly a similar distance from the Sun.

How big is the planet?

Earth and Venus Comparison

Venus is very close in size to earth and with a diameter of about 12,100 km or almost
95% of the size of the Earth. This is one of the reasons why Venus is often considered to
be the "twin" to the Earth, and it is also made up of very similar minerals that are found
on the Earth.
What is its surface like?

Picture from the Russian Spacecraft Venera 13 on the Surface of Venus

Maat Mons on the Surface of Venus, by radar imaging

Venus has a very interesting surface. It is very, very dry and also hot enough to melt lead
on its surface. We could not survive on the planet because of this. Anyone attempting to
walk on the surface of Venus would boil to death, be squashed flat by the pressure, and
then have their remains eaten away by the corrosive atmosphere. One of its highest
mountains, named the Maxwell Montes, is roughly 2 km taller than Mount Everest.
Because Venus has a very thick atmosphere, meteors slow down as they fall toward it's
surface, so no craters that are smaller than about 3.2 km round can form. Almost 90% of
Venus' surface is made up of recently-solidified basalt lava, meaning that Venus has
experienced a lot of volcanic activity from time to time. The oldest parts on Venus are
thought to be only around 800 million years old.

The Venera 13 Lander, which made scientific measurements and pictures from the
surface of Venus.

Is there life on Venus?

When astronomers first tried to make observations of Venus, they thought that Venus
would have a very Earth-like environment, although slightly warmer than the Earth.
Venus is almost the same size as the Earth, and covered with clouds, and it was assumed
that these might be water clouds like are found here on the Earth.
Many stories written during this time described Venus as having a swamp-like
environment, but still something that people could go and visit someday, and even live
on. Sometimes exotic aliens were thought to live on Venus, just like people thought the
same thing about Mars.
The debate on whether there were living things on Venus continued until robotic
spacecraft traveled to the surface of Venus and directly measured the thickness of the
atmosphere, what chemicals it contained, and the temperature. The environment on
Venus is deadly to almost any living thing on Earth, and it is unlikely that manned
exploration of its surface will ever happen. Spaceships that land on Venus must be very
strong in order to work with the very high atmospheric pressures on its surface, and to
withstand the acids in the atmosphere. One of the gases found on the surface is Sulfuric
Acid, which is the same chemical that is used in car batteries, and very toxic if you eat or
breathe it. There are many other chemicals that are just as deadly if you were to breathe
them in.

Phases of Venus

After telescopes were invented, one of the very first places that they tried to study was
Venus. Even with a modest telescope this is a fairly easy feature to identify. Just like the
Earth's Moon has phases during different times of the month, Venus also appears to go
through similar kinds of phases where it appears in a crecent shape during some parts of
its orbit around the Sun. This visual appearance is caused because Venus is closer to the
Sun than the Earth, and we are looking at the night sky of Venus, or the part of Venus that
is facing away from the Sun.
This is slightly different than the phases of the Earth's Moon, because the distance
between the Earth and Venus varies quite a bit. When Venus is at its closest point to the
Earth, it appears as a thin crecent or even can't be seen at all. Only when Venus is almost
at a location furthest from the Earth can a full disk be seen through a telescope.
Sometimes on rare occasions, Venus actually crosses directly between the Sun and the
Earth. This is called a transit, which is very similar to a solar eclipse by the Earth's
Moon. Many early details about Venus were discovered this way, including
approximately how large Venus was, and the fact that it had an atmosphere due to how
"fuzzy" the outline of Venus was against the Sun. During a transit of the Sun, Venus
appears as a small circle going across the Sun's photosphere.

What is its moon like?

Early in history Venus was once thought to have a moon, named Neith after the
mysterious goddess of Sais. The moon was first seen by Giovanni Domenico Cassini in
1672. Astronomers saw this moon from time to time until 1892, until they found out
their sightings were mostly faint stars that were in the right place at the right time and
now Venus is known to be moonless.
Venus's rotation is so slow that if Venus had a moon, it would crash into Venus or get
broken up. This would happen because the moon's gravity would cause tidal effects on
Venus. There would be two bulges called tidal bulges on Venus. One would bulge toward
the moon, with the other bulge being on the opposite side of Venus. The moon's motion
in its orbit would be faster than Venus's rotation because Venus's rotation is very slow.
That would cause the moon to be ahead of the tidal bulge all the time. The gravity from
the bulge would pull back on the moon. This would cause the moon to become closer to
Venus and Venus's rotation to speed up. This would continue to happen over millions of
years until the moon got broken up by Venus's gravity or crashed onto Venus. Venus had
existed for billions of years, so if it had any moon, it is long gone.

How long is a day on this planet?

Venus rotates even more slowly than Mercury. One siderial day on Venus is about 243
Earth days long. This is the time it takes for a distant star to go from being directly
overhead to being above you again. One solar day on Venus is about 117 Earth days long,
or the time it takes for the sun to be over one spot on Venus to returning to that same
position. The reason for this difference is that Venus is also going around the Sun at the
same time it is turning. There is a difference between sideral and solar days on the Earth
as well, but because the Earth is spinning so quickly compared to Venus it is only a
difference of a few minutes each day instead of over a hundred days like it is on Venus.
It also rotates the opposite direction from most of the planets in the Solar System. This is
called retrograde motion, where the Sun rises in the west and sets in the east, from the
viewpoint of somebody standing on the surface of Venus.
This rotation period is also rather unusual because of an interesting coincidence with this
orbital period and the Earth. Venus always seems to have the same side of its planet
facing the Earth as it passes close to the Earth, almost as if Venus had a tidal lock on the
Earth like the Earth's Moon. From the perspective of somebody standing on Venus, Earth
would always be in the same spot in the sky year after year. What causes this behavior
from Venus is totally unknown, and may be a pure luck, but many scientists often
discover new ideas by studying a coincidence like this.

How long is a year on this planet?

One Venus year is 224.7 Earth days long. So, one Venus day is longer than one Venus
year. There is an interesting coincidence with this period of time as well, because from
one conjunction between the Earth and Venus to the next one (when the Earth and Venus
are closest together and on the same side of the sun) is 584 days. What is unusual about
this number is that it happens five times every eight years on the Earth, in a pattern that is
very close to the same orbital time period of the Earth around the Sun.
25 x 117 (Earth days in a Venus solar day) = 2925 days
5 x 584 (Earth days between conjunction of Earth and Venus) = 2920 days
8 x 365 (Earth days in an Earth year) = 2920 days

This was known to ancient astronomers and played an important part in the design of
many ancient calendars, including some eight year cycles where the pattern that Venus
followed in the sky was watched very closely. There is no current scientific theory to
explain this coincidence other than it just happened to be like this.

What is it made of?

Like Earth, Venus appears to have have a crust and mantle made of silicates and an iron
core. There are a number of features on the surface of Venus that resemble features found
on the Earth, so it is likely that many of the internal characteristics of both the Earth and
Venus are the same.

How much would Venus's gravity pull on me?

If you were on Venus, it would pull you down with a force about nine tenths as strong as
the force of Earth's gravity.
Who is it named after?

Artistic representation of Venus

Venus is named after the Roman goddess of love. It looked bright in the sky sometimes,
so it was named after the beautiful goddess. Venus is also associated with the Greek
goddess Aphrodite, as well as Frigg and Freya in Norse mythology. Indeed, almost every
ancient culture had Venus as a major deity, although not all of them were female. An
example of the planet being named after a male diety is Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli, one of the
Aztec gods, together with his brother Xolotl.
 Earth

Earth Facts:
• The Earth is the only planet in
the known universe which is
capable of supporting life as
we know it.
• Some of the heat in the Earth's
mantle actually comes from
the breakdown of radioactive
material. The pieces of rock
and metal that collected to
The Earth seen from space make the Earth brought in the
rest of the energy when they
fell onto the planet.
Earth is the planet we live on. It is the only planet
in the solar system with liquid water. It's also the only one known to have life.

How big is the Earth?

The Earth is 12,742 km in diameter. It's the largest terrestrial planet in the solar system.
The Earth weighs 5,973,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg. (That's nearly 6 trillion trillion
kilograms)

How old is the Earth?

Scientific evidence shows that the Earth is 4.6 billion years old.

What is its surface like?

Moraine Lake by Lake Louise Alberta, Canada

Earth's surface is made of continents and oceans. There are also islands in the oceans.
The top layer of Earth is called the crust. It divided into pieces called tectonic plates.
They move very slowly, carrying continents with them. The places where they meet are
called fault lines. On fault lines, magma can seep up through the cracks and create
volcanoes (once on the surface it's called lava.) When fault lines move apart they create
new land (these are called constructive margins) and where they move towards each
other one of them goes underneath the other (these are called destructive margins.)
When they slide past each other, great tension builds up due to friction - when this
tension is released the plates move rapidly and sharply in one direction, creating
earthquakes.

Anawhata beach, west of Auckland, New Zealand

Earth has many kinds of environments. It is cold and icy in places like Antarctica. There
are hot, dry deserts in some parts of the world like Africa and Arabia, and cold, dry
deserts in some others like Siberia. Rain forests grow where it is warm and wet, in
equatorial zones (these are areas a few hundred miles around a very hot 'line' called the
equator. Outside equatorial zones there are areas of very dry, mostly hot desert, which is
where all the water making the rainforests wet comes from, causing these areas to be very
dry. Other kinds of forests grow between the Equator and the Poles, like the massive
coniferous forests of pine and other trees which keep their leaves all the time, and
deciduous forests of oak, beech and other leaf-losing plants. Some places are very wet
and are called swamps or marshes. There are grasslands, many hot, some called
savannahs, with lots of grass and few trees. There are also mountains, caused by
collision of tectonic plates. Some of them are high with snow and ice on their tops all
year. Others are lower and more rounded.

Is there life on the Earth?

When this question is asked on other planets in the solar system, it is important to know
where you might find living things here on the Earth. Almost every important feature of
the surface of the earth is in some way affected by living things, including mineral
deposits and even the content of the air that we breathe.
One of the critical ingredients that all living things seem to need is water. Wherever you
find liquid water, you will almost always find living things, even if it is not a place where
you would want to live as a person. Bacteria has been found inside gysers, where the
water temperature can be over 300° C. These living things not only live there, but even
seem to need those very high temperatures. Other living things have been found on the
bottom of the ocean, living around "thermal vents" where the only energy they obtain is
from lava heating up water. It is so deep in the ocean that no sunlight ever appears there.
Finally, you can find living things in Antarctica where it is always covered with ice, or
even at the top of mountains in the form of lichens, growing where otherwise nothing else
could live.
Galileo being deployed after being launched by the Space Shuttle Atlantis
Is the Earth unique because only this planet could have living things growing on it? It
would seem unlikely that this is the only planet in the Universe that has living things like
we know them, and it is suspected that there are many other places in the Solar System
where life might be. If liquid water is discovered anywhere else in the Solar System, you
might just find some living things there too. There are other worlds in the Solar System
where liquid water indeed has been found, so many scientists continue to look for signs
on life on other planets.
An interesting experiment was conducted in December, 1990, where the Galileo
spacecraft, on a journey to Jupiter, went past the Earth after having gone on a orbit around
the sun earlier. In this situation, the scientists who were running the space probe decided
to test the equipment to see if they could detect signs of life on the Earth. In addition to
simply taking pictures of the Earth, it also detected signs of water, oxygen, and other
elements and chemicals that are necessary for life. This information was then used to both
see if these same instruments could detect life elsewhere, and to calibrate the instruments
to make more accurate measurements when it arrived at Jupiter.

What are its moons like?

Earth has one permanent moon named Luna, or more commonly called the Moon. Earth
also has a number of temporary natural satellites, the largest of which is the three-mile-
wide body named Cruithne [pronounced 'KROOee-nyuh']. Discovered in 1986, Cruithne
follows an eccentric horseshoe-shaped orbit that takes 770 years to complete.

How long is a day on the Earth?

A day on Earth is 24 hours long (solar) and 23 hours 56 minutes (sidereal). It is how long
it takes the Earth to spin once on its axis.

How long is a year on the Earth?

A year on Earth is 365 days long. It is how long it takes Earth to orbit the sun once.
What is it made of?

The Earth has a crust and mantle made of silicates and an inner and outer core. The crust
is the surface layer. It is up to 5 km deep under the oceans and up to 35 km deep under the
continents. Despite being so thin, scientists have not ever drilled all the way through the
crust. The mantle extends from the bottom of the crust down to 2900 km under the
surface. Under the mantle there is the liquid iron outer core. It extends from 2900 to
5100 km under the surface. At the center of Earth there is the solid inner core. It is made
of iron and nickel.

How much would I weigh on Earth?

It's easy to find your weight on Earth by using a scale. You have weight because the Earth
pulls you towards its center. (Normally, the ground or the floor get in the way, making
you feel 'stuck' to them.) This force is known as gravity.
..... There are several kinds of scales:

1) Comparing of 2 masses (weights). You put the thing(s) you want to weigh on one pan
(like some marbles), and then you put several "weights" on the other pan until the pointer
shows that both pans have equal weights on them. Then you look at the pan with the
known weights on it, and add them all up. The total is the mass of the thing(s) you want
to weigh.
2) A spring balance usually has a hook on it, with a pan. You put the thing(s) you want to
weigh on the pan, the spring is pulled, and the greater the weight, the further the spring is
pulled. That distance, calibrated in pounds or kilogram (or whatever), is usually shown
either on a dial or on a linear scale.

3) There are also electronic scales that give a properly calibrated reading—grocery stores,
for example, use these.

NOTE: gravity varies slightly depending on the location where you want to get the
weight; spring balances and some electronic scales can, in theory, read slightly different
weights at different places because of that, but usually in practice that difference it too
small to be noticed. But, because the balance type of scales work differently to the spring
or electronic types, they will always read the true, correct mass. The would even give the
same mass on the moon! (where gravity is much less than on Earth)

Did you know? that Sir Isaac Newton was the first person to realise that the force pulling
you down to the ground was the same force that keeps the planets going around the sun?
The story goes that he thought of this when he saw an apple fall from a tree.
Gravity is a very important force. As well as keeping you firmly stuck to the Earth, it
keeps the Moon going round the Earth, The Earth going around the Sun and the Sun
going around the center of the Milky Way galaxy. Gravity also makes stars and planets a
nice round ball shape. In fact without gravity there wouldn't even be a sun, moon or earth.
(The material that they are made of would just float away into space)

Who is it named after?

The Earth seen from the surface of the moon

The word earth is used for both planet Earth and soil. Other names had been used for
Earth such as Gaia and Tellus. Gaia is the Greek god of Earth. Tellus is the Roman name
of the same god.
 Mars

Mars Facts:
• Mars is red because of rust.
• A volcano on Mars called
Olympus Mons is the highest
mountain in our solar system.
• Mars has polar ice caps just
like Earth.

Valles Marineris on Mars

Mars is the fourth planet. It is a terrestrial planet.

How big is the planet?

Comparison of the size of Mars and the Earth

Mars is 6,804.9 km or 0.533 Earths in diameter. That makes it a little more than half of
Earth's size.

What is its surface like?

Panorama from the Mars Rover "Spirit"

The surface of Mars is dry and dusty. The highlands of the southern hemisphere have
more craters than the lower areas in the northern hemisphere. One of the craters is the
huge Hellas Planitia. It is 2100 km across.

Olympus Mons
There is an area called the Tharsis Bulge that has four huge volcanos. These volcanos
have not erupted for millions of years. The largest one is Olympus Mons. It is 27 km tall,
making it the highest mountain in the solar system and much higher than Mount Everest
on Earth. It is 540 km across, making it too big to see the whole thing from the surface of
Mars.
Mars has a huge canyon called Valles Marineris that is much bigger than the Grand
Canyon on Earth. It is 4000 km long, up to 7 km deep and up to 200 km wide. It it
thought that Valles Marineris was made when the surface cracked when the Tharsis
Bulge formed.
There are also two ice caps at the poles. They are made of carbon dioxide and water ices.
The northern one is large and the southern one is small.
In some places, there are channels that look like they were made by water erosion. Mars
may have once been a wet planet like Earth.
If you got in a spaceship and landed on the surface of Mars, you would notice that there is
air and an atmosphere, but it is very thin. When you are standing at the bottom of Valles
Marineris, there is almost the same air pressure as you would find on the top of the tallest
mountain on Earth, Mount Everest. Even then, you would not want to breathe it because
it has very little oxygen, and much more carbon dioxide than on the Earth. Carbon
dioxide is the gas that you send out from your lungs when you are breathing. Even with
these problems, someday people will travel to Mars and walk on its surface.

Is there life on Mars?

This is a question that many scientists have been asking for a very long time. When
telescopes were first became powerful enough to study Mars in detail, the Italian
astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli spotted lines on the surface of Mars that he believed to
be like rivers. Unfortunately this word in Italian, when translated into English was also
the same word for canals, and that sparked the imaginations of many people to believe
that there was not only living things on Mars, but an advanced civilization of people that
built cities and structures that could be seen on the Earth, like the Great Wall of China is
visible from space as the sign advanced tool making.
Popular fiction took advantage of this interest, and the notion of Martians invading the
Earth is a common idea in stories like this. Perhaps the most famous story using this idea
is the novel "The War of the Worlds", by H.G. Wells, which includes some scientific
opinions of what astronomers thought might be on Mars when that book was written.
This story has since been made into a movie on several occasions, theatrical stage
productions, and even radio dramas.
Most astronomers and space scientists no longer believe that there is an advanced
civilization on Mars. The question is now if anything, even small plants and animals ever
lived on Mars in the past or are still living there. This question is still unanswered, but
there have been some attempts to find out.

Model of Viking Lander

In 1976, robot spacecraft from Earth called Viking landers went to Mars to find out.
When it landed, the pictures of Mars that came back to Earth made Mars look very much
like a desert, with very little water. Some experiements that were done to Martian soil
seemed to indicate there was no life on Mars, although one experiment did indicate that
there might be something alive in the soil. Even that experiment, however, was not
convincing.
Shortly after the Viking space missions, a rock was discovered in Antarctica that was
believed to have come from Mars. When scientists examined the inside of that rock, they
discovered that there might be an ancient fossil of some bacteria.
Another robotic spacecraft called Mars Observer has been orbiting Mars for several
years now, and it has taken photos of riverbeds and other features on the surface that
suggest that Mars had liquid water flowing on the surface. If this is true, it seems likely
that at least some very simple form of life may have lived on Mars as well.
In spite of all the scientific research to search for life on Mars, the question still hasn't
been completely answered, and this is something that is debated by scientists even today.
What are its moons like?

The Moons of Mars

It is believed that these moons did not originally orbit Mars, but were instead a part of the
Asteroid belt. When these pieces of the Solar System came close to Mars, they were
captured by the gravity of Mars and went into relatively stable orbits around Mars. Like
the Earth's moon, these moons are in a tidal lock, always keeping the same face towards
Mars while they are in orbit.
Mars has two natural satellites:

Phobos

In Roman mythology both Phobos and Deimos were the sons of the Roman god Mars.
Phobos means "fear" or "fright". Phobos also orbits closer to Mars than any other moon to
any other major planet in the solar system. In a few million years Phobos will eventually
crash into the surface of Mars due to orbital decay, where it goes closer to the surface of
Mars every year.

Deimos

Deimos means "panic" or "dread" as the son of Mars. Deimos is one of the smallest
moons of any planet in the Solar System (so far).

How long is a day on this planet?

One day on Mars is only a little longer than an Earth day at 1.025 Earth days.A year is 1
Earth year and 322 Earth days long.
What is it made of?
It is thought that Mars has an iron and sulfur core and a mantle and crust made of
silicate.

How much would Mars's gravity pull on me?

If you were on Mars, it would pull you down with a force about two fifths as strong as the
force of Earth's gravity.

Who is it named after?

Due to its red appearence in the sky, Mars is named after the Roman god of war. Also it
was named after the Great War of Canto.
 Jupiter

Jupiter Facts:
• Due to its magnetic field
trapping particles from the
Sun, Jupiter is surrounded by
very powerful radiation belts
which would kill anyone who
entered them.
• Jupiter's moon Europa is
thought to have a giant ocean
Jupiter (Note the red spot) below its surface.
Jupiter is by far the largest planet within our solar system: two and a half times larger
than all of the other planets put together. It is the fifth planet from the Sun and one of the
brightest planets. Jupiter is sometimes called a "gas giant" because most of this planet is
made up of liquid and gas.
• Jupiter's magnetic field is the largest single thing in the solar system. It is 26
million kilometers across, making it about 20 times bigger than the Sun. It has a
tail that extends past Saturn's orbit. If it could be seen from Earth, it would appear
to be five times the size of the full moon.

How big is the planet?

Jupiter is 142,984 km or 11.209 Earths in diameter at the equator. That makes it about
one tenth as big as the sun. About one thousand four hundred Earths could fit into the
volume of Jupiter. It is 133,709 km or 10.517 Earths in diameter from pole to pole.
Jupiter's rapid rotation makes it bulge out at the equator.

What is its surface like?

Jupiter does not have a solid surface. This enormous planet has a relatively small solid
and rocky core. Liquids and gases surround this core and blend with the atmosphere.
Jupiter is a cloudy, windy and stormy planet. It is always covered by a layer of clouds,
and wind speeds of 600 km/h are not uncommon. The storms are visible as swirls, bands
and spots. A particularly violent storm, about three times Earth's diameter, is known as
the Great Red Spot. This storm has been in existance for nearly 300 years!
The layer of clouds is divided into several bands. The lighter colored bands are called
zones and the darker bands are called belts. The colors are caused by small changes in the
temperature and chemistry. Each band rotates in the opposite direction from its neighbors.
Along the edges where the bands meet, these winds collide and create swirling patterns.
The stormy atmosphere of Jupiter has flashes of lightning just like on Earth. However
these can be up to 100 times more powerful. The lightning is made by water near the tops
of the clouds.

What are its rings like?

Jupiter's rings are dark and hard to see. They are made of tiny particles that meteors
knocked off Jupiter's small inner moons.

What are its moons like?

Jupiter has 63 known moons. There are four major moons that were discovered by
Galileo in 1610. Those moons are Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. They are called the
Galilean moons. There are often eclipses on Jupiter's cloud tops by the Galilean moons.

Amalthea Group

There are four small moons orbiting inside Io's orbit. That group is called the Amalthea
group because Amalthea is the largest one. They are all small and potato shaped.
Amalthea is very red. The material of Jupiter's rings came from meteors knocking it off of
those moons.

Io

Io is Jupiter's closest major moon. It is 3643.2 km across, slightly larger than Earth's
Moon. It has volcanos and molten sulfur lakes. There are not very many craters if there
are any at all because the volcanic activity would cover them up. Io has an iron and
maybe iron sulfide core at least 1800 km across. It is surrounded by a silicate shell. There
is little water on Io. Maybe it was because when Jupiter was forming, it was hot enough
to dry out Io, but not the other major moons. In Roman mythology Io was a beautiful
young woman that Jupiter loved.

Europa

Europa is 3,121.6 km across, about ten percent smaller than Earth's Moon. It is made of
silicates and has a layer of smooth water ice 10 to 30 km thick. The ice has long cracks in
it and very few craters. It looks like the sea ice on Earth. The ice had slid around at the
cracks. There is liquid water under the ice up to 100 km below the surface. There are also
some large spots on the surface. In Roman mythology Europa was courted by Jupiter in
the form of a bull.

Jupiter as seen by the space probe "Cassini". This is the most detailed color portrait of
Jupiter ever assembled.

Ganymede

Ganymede is 5262.4 km across, making it 380 km bigger than Mercury. It is Jupiter's

largest moon and the largest moon in the solar system. It had plate tectonics like Earth.
There are older darker regions and newer areas with grooves where the plates moved.
Newer craters have bright rays around them from material thrown up by impacts. Older
craters look flat and faded because the icy surface does not hold the shape of the crater as
well as rock does over long periods of time. Ganymede may have an iron and sulfur core
with a silicate mantle and an icy shell. It may be like an Io with a layer of ice on it. In
Roman mythology Ganymede was a beautiful young man who Jupiter kidnapped and
made cupbearer to the gods on Mt. Olympus.

Callisto

Callisto is 4820.6 km across, about the same size as Mercury. It has many craters. Like
craters on Ganymede, the older craters had faded. The largest crater is Valhalla. It has a
bright center 600 km across with rings around it up to 3000 km across. Callisto is made
of silicates and ice. There is a 200 km thick icy crust with a liquid water sea under it. In
Roman mythology Callisto was turned into a bear by Jupiter's jealous wife Juno. Later
Jupiter placed her in the stars as The Great Bear.

Other moons

The other moons are tiny ones in several groups outside the orbits of the major moons,
there is a small moon, Themisto and four groups of little moons that orbit very far from
Jupiter.
How long is a day on this planet?
One Jupiter day is about 10 Earth hours long.

How long is a year on this planet?

One year on Jupiter is 4,335 Earth days or 11.87 Earth years long.
A Jupiter year is about equal to four-tenths (or two-fifths) of a Saturn year. Thus after
every two Saturn years, Jupiter has completed five full orbits about the Sun. So after 59
years, Saturn and Jupiter will be back in nearly the same position. When the orbits of two
planets are simple ratios of each other like this, it is called a resonance.

The Great Red Spot

Jupiter Eclipses
What is it made of?

The interior of Jupiter contains a small rocky core, surrounded by hydrogen that is under
such intense pressure it forms a metal. During the transition zone the hydrogen gradually
changes from metal to liquid and finally gas.
Jupiter has a rocky core. Around the core, there is metallic hydrogen. On top of that is
liquid and then gaseous hydrogen. There is no place where the hydrogen suddenly turns
from a gas to a liquid.
The gaseous hydrogen is part of Jupiter's atmosphere. Other gases there include helium,,
methane, water, and ammonia!

How much would Jupiter's gravity pull on me?

If you were floating close to the cloud tops of Jupiter, it would pull you down with a force
about two and a half times as strong as the force of Earth's gravity.
Jupiter's rapid rotation causes the equator to bulge out. This would also cancel out about
10 percent of gravity's force on you if you were at the equator. The amount of this
counteraction becomes lower the closer you get to the poles.

Who is it named after?

Statue of Zeus (Jupiter) in Olympia, Greece

Jupiter is named after the chief of the Roman gods, also called Zeus in ancient Greece. It
was so named because of the planet's enormous size, which dominates all the others.
 Saturn

Saturn Facts:
• If you could find a bathtub big
enough, Saturn would float in
it.
• Some of Saturn's moons
control the width of its rings.
• add description.
Saturn casts a shadow on its rings

How big is the planet?

Saturn is 120,536 km or 9.449 Earths in diameter at the equator. It is only 108,728 km or
8.552 Earths in diameter from pole to pole. It is bigger at the equator because it spins fast
enough to budge out.

What is its surface like?

Saturn has no surface that you could stand on without going deep into its atmosphere.
The atmosphere has bands, but they're not as colorful as Jupiter's.

What are its rings like?

Saturn's rings are composed of silica rock, iron oxide, and ice particles ranging in size
from specks of dust to the size of a small automobile.
What are its moons like?

Saturn with some of its moons

Saturn has at least 48 moons. The exact number of Saturn's moons will never be known
because of the similar sizes of the moons and the chunks of ice in Saturn's rings.

Shepherd moons

There are small potato shaped moons in or near Saturn's rings. They control the ring
particles with their gravity. That is why they are called shepherd moons. Six of them are
known and there may be more.

Mimas

Mimas is made mostly of water ice with a little rock. It has a large crater for its size
called Herschel. It is 130 km across, making it about a third as big as Mimas.

Enceladus

Enceladus is made of ice. It has smooth areas, cracks and some craters. The smooth areas
are younger. Craters there got erased within the past 100 million years.

Tethys

Tethys is an icy moon that has many craters, including the huge Odysseus. It is 400 km
across, a quarter as big as Tethys. The crater had become flattened because the icy
material doesn't hold its shape as well as rock would. There is also a large valley called
Ithaca Chasma. It is 3 to 5 km deep, 100 km wide and 2000 km long, three fourth of the
way around Tethys. There are two moons, Telesto and Calypso, that share Tethys's orbit.
Telesto is ahead of Tethys and Calypso is behind it..

Dione

Dione is made of lots of ice and maybe some rock in the core. It has lots of craters. The
craters are flattened because the ice doesn't hold their shape as well as rock. One side has
bright white lines that are cliffs made of ice. There is one moon, Helene, that is ahead of
Dione in its orbit.

Rhea

Rhea is an icy moon similar to Dione with some rock in the core. It has many craters on
one side and the other side has some bright white icy areas.

Titan

Titan is the largest moon of Saturn and the second largest one in the solar system. It is the
only moon in the solar system that has a thick atmosphere. The atmosphere is made of
nitrogen, methane and various organic compounds. Its surface has light and dark areas
and few craters. However, the Cassini probe discovered a huge crater, 440 km across,
with its radar. The Huygens probe was carried by Cassini. It got released from Cassini
and landed on Titan. It sent back pictures of Titan's surface. Titan has a gigantic
atmosphere, extending hundreds of kilometers above the surface.

Hyperion

Hyperion is made of water ice with a little rock. It is potato shaped. It wobbles instead of
rotating in the same way other moons do.

Iapetus

Iapetus it made of ice with a little rock. It has a light area, Roncevaux Terra with craters.
There is a big dark area called Cassini Regio that covers half of Iapetus. The dark
material may be made of organic compounds. Some of it is on the bottom of craters.
Some huge craters and a ridge had been discovered in Cassini Regio by the Cassini probe.
The ridge stretches 1300 km along the equator It is up to 20 km high, which is over 20
times higher than Mount Everest.

Phoebe

Phoebe is made of ice and rock, but looks dark because it has a layer dark material on the
outside. It also looks rough.

Other moons

There are two groups of small outer moons. Phoebe is part of the outermost group.

How long is a day on this planet?

One day on Saturn is about 10 hours and 40 minutes in Earth time.

How long is a year on this planet?

One year on Saturn is 29.45 or about 29 and a half Earth years long. That is 10,758 Earth
days!
A Saturn year is almost exactly equal to two and half Jupiter years. Thus after every two
Saturn years, Jupiter has completed five full orbits about the Sun. So after 59 years,
Saturn and Jupiter will be back in nearly the same position. When the orbits of two
planets are simple ratios of each other, it is called a resonance.

What is it made of?

Saturn has a rocky core. Around the core, there is liquid metallic hydrogen. On top of
that is gaseous hydrogen. There is no place where the hydrogen suddenly turns from a gas
to a liquid.
The gaseous hydrogen is part of Saturn's atmosphere. Other gases there include helium
and some other gases. There may be rain made of helium falling through the hydrogen.

How much would Saturn's gravity pull on me?

If you were floating close to the cloud tops of Saturn, it would pull you down with a force
only a little stronger than the force of Earth's gravity. The effects of Saturn's large radius
and its mass almost cancel out, making the force only a little bigger.
Saturn's rapid rotation causes the equator to bulge out. This would also cancel out about
10 percent of gravity's force on you if you were at the equator. The amount of this
counteraction becomes lower the closer you get to the poles.
Who is it named after?
Saturn is named after the Roman god of corn, nature and agriculture.

Map of the Saturn system (NASA)

 Uranus

Uranus Facts:
• Uranus's rings may look white
in pictures, but they are
actually made of asphalt-
colored material.
• When it was first discovered
Uranus was though to be a
star and was given the number
34 Tauri.
• Uranus is the only planet
besides Pluto in our solar
Uranus as seen from Voyager 2 system that rotates on its side.
Uranus, the seventh planet from the sun, was
discovered by William Herschel on March 13, 1781. It is a gas giant and the third largest
planet in the Solar System.

How big is the planet?

Uranus is 51,118 km or 4.007 Earths in diameter. This means that about four Earths
placed in a line side by side would be as long as Uranus is across.

What is its surface like?

Uranus has no surface that you could stand on without going deep into the atmosphere.
What are its moons like?

Uranus's rings and moons

Uranus has 27 discovered moons, which places it third in the solar system for number of
moons! The five main ones are Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon.

Miranda

Miranda is the smallest and closest of Uranus's major moons. It is mainly made of water
ice, and silicate rocks. There are also some methane related organic compounds.
Miranda also has canyons 20 km deep. Miranda was named after a character in "The
Tempest", a play by Shakespeare. A color composite picture of Miranda was taken with
by Voyager 2 on January 24, 1986, from a distance of 147,000 kilometres.

Ariel

Ariel is half water ice with the rest being silicate rocks and methane ice. Ariel doesn't
have many craters and has big canyons.Ariel was named after the helpful sprite in "The
Tempest" by Shakespeare.

Umbriel

Umbriel is made of lots of water ice and some silicate rocks and methane ice. It is also
the darkest of Uranus's major moons. Umbriel was named after a character in the comic
poem "The Rape of the Lock" by Alexander Pope.

Titania

Titania is the largest moon of Uranus. The majority of it is water ice, with quite a lot of
silicate thrown in with some methane related organic compounds. Like Ariel, Titania also
has some huge canyons. It was named after the Queen of the Fairies in " A Midsummer's
Night Dream", a play by Shakespeare.
Oberon

Oberon is the outermost of the major moons of Uranus. It is very similar to Titania in
what it is made of. It has many craters. Some of them have white rays around them and
dark crater floors. The dark material may be made of organic compounds. It was named
after the King of the Fairies in "A Midsummer's Night Dream".

Other moons

There are 13 tiny moons known to be orbiting Uranus inside Miranda's orbit. Nine more
tiny moons are known to be in big orbits beyond Oberon's orbit.

How long is a day on this planet?

One day on Uranus is about 17 Earth hours long. Uranus spins on its side. Maybe it was
because of a big impact early in the history of the solar system.

How long is a year on this planet?

One year on Uranus would be 30,708 days or 84 years on Earth.

What is it made of?

Unlike Jupiter and Saturn, Uranus is thought to be made mostly of rock and ices with
only 15 percent of it being hydrogen. The gases in its atmosphere are mostly hydrogen
and helium. Other gases found in smaller amounts are ammonia, water, and methane.
The methane gives Uranus its blue-green color. Under the atmosphere, it is thought that
there is an uniform mixture of rocky and icy materials rather than a seperate rocky core.

How much would Uranus's gravity pull on me?

If you were floating close to the cloud tops of Uranus, it would pull you down with a
force about nine tenths as strong as the force of Earth's gravity. The effects of Uranus's
large radius and its mass almost cancel out, making the force only a little bigger.
Uranus's rotation is not as rapid as that of Jupiter and Saturn. That means its equator does
not bulge out as much. So, Uranus's rotation would not cancel out as much of its gravity's
force.

Who is it named after?

Uranus was named after Ouranos, the Greek name for the sky. According to Greek
mythology, Ouranos was the husband of Gaia, Mother Earth.
 Neptune
Neptune is very similar to Uranus, but it is slightly smaller in diameter and more massive.

Neptune Facts:
• Wind speeds on Neptune can
reach 450 meters per second.
• Neptune was discovered
because its gravitational field
was affecting the orbit of
Uranus.
• Neptune is sometimes the
ninth planet from the Sun.

Neptune as seen from Voyager 2

How big is the planet ?

Neptune has a diameter of 49,528 km across at the equator and 48,681 km from pole to
pole. It is almost as big as four Earths in a row. It bulges out a little at the equator because
of its rotation, but not as much as Jupiter and Saturn.

What is its surface like?

Neptune is a gas giant so it does not have a surface that you can stand on without going
deep into its atmosphere. The atmosphere looks blue-green. It has some dark blue spots.
When the Voyager probe went by Neptune in 1989, there was a large one called the Great
Dark Spot. Now it is gone and there are new spots. There are some high white clouds too.
The winds of Neptune are very fast, blowing at up to 2000 km per hour. That is about ten
times faster than the winds of some of Earth's strongest tornadoes.

What are its rings like?

Neptune has some faint rings that are dark and hard to see. There are clumps in some
parts of the rings where the material is more dense. It could be because of the gravity of
the nearby small inner moons of Neptune.

What are its moons like?

Neptune has 13 known moons. There could be more.
Inner moons

There are five small potato shaped moons orbiting close to Neptune.

Proteus

Proteus is a dark moon about 420 km across. It is irregularly shaped, but it is almost big
enough for its gravity to pull it into a sphere. In Roman mythology Proteus was Neptune's
herdman who could change into any shape he wanted.

Triton

Triton is the largest moon of Neptune. Scientists think that it is a lot like Pluto. It is 2700
km across. It is made of rock and some water ice. It has a surface temperature of −236 °C
making it the coldest world visited by spacecraft. Triton has a very thin atmosphere made
up nitrogen and a little methane.
There are volcanoes that have eruptions of liquid nitrogen, dust, or methane compounds.
The eruptions happen because of the seasons. They make plumes up to 8 km high. There
are few craters because the eruptions cover them up. There are ice caps of nitrogen and
methane ice that change sizes with the seasons. There are also ridges and valleys. They
may have formed because the changing seasons caused the material to repeatly freeze and
warm up.
An interesting thing about Triton's orbit is that it goes around Neptune in the opposite
direction from the direction of Neptune's rotation. Because of that, scientists think that
Triton was captured by Neptune long ago. Its orbit is also very circular. Neptune's gravity
made the orbit circular over a long time after the capture. The tidal effects involved in
that may have heated Triton and kept ices melted for a billion years. In Roman
mythology, Triton was the son of Neptune.

Nereid

Nereid is an irregularly shaped moon about 340 km across. Its orbit is very eccentric or
noncircular. It may have been captured by Neptune or moved into the eccentric orbit by
Triton's gravity when Triton got captured. In Roman mythology nereids were sea nymphs.

Outer moons

There are five other known moons. They are small potateo-shaped moons far from
Neptune. There could be more yet to be discovered.

How long is a day on this planet?

A day on Neptune lasts 16 hour and 7 minutes.
What is it made of?
Neptune is made of rock and metal in the core. The core is probably bigger than Uranus's
because Neptune weighs more, but is the same size. Around the core is rock, water,
ammonia and methane. The atmosphere makes up most of the planet and is made of
hydrogen and helium. Lower down in the atmosphere, there is methane and ammonia
too. The methane makes Neptune look blue-green.

How much would I weigh on Neptune?

If you were floating close to the cloud tops of Neptune, it would pull you down with a
force only a little stronger than the force of Earth's gravity. The effects of Neptune's larger
radius and its mass almost cancel out, making the force only a little bigger.
Neptune's rotation is not as rapid as that of Jupiter and Saturn. That means its equator
does not bulge out as much. So, Neptune's rotation would not cancel out as much of its
gravity's force.

Who is it named after?

Artistic impression of Neptune

Neptune is named after the Roman god of the seas, also known as Poseidon in ancient
Greece.
 Pluto

Pluto Facts:
• Pluto is the smallest planet
• Most often, it is farthest away
Pluto and its moon Charon from the sun, but sometimes
Pluto, the ninth planet in the Solar System, was Neptune is.
accidentally discovered by the astronomer Clyde • Some astronomers believe
W. Tombaugh in Arizona on February 18, 1930. that Pluto and its moon
Charon are actually a "double
planet", because Charon does
not orbit around Pluto.

Pluto and Charon from the Hubble Space Telescope

How big is the planet?

Pluto is the smallest of all of the planets in the Solar System, weighing only
13,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilograms. While this may seem large, it's only about
1/500th of the Earth's mass. If you were to cut Pluto in half and measure the length on the
inside, you'd find that Pluto is 2390 kilometers across, and with a little math you could
figure out that its surface area is about 17,950,000 square kilometers (or 1/30th of the
Earth's) and that its volume is 7,150,000,000 (or 1/15th of the Earth's).

What is its surface like?

We don't really know for sure. No spacecraft has ever been there, and Pluto is so far away
from Earth that even the best telescopes can't see any detail. It is certainly very cold,
about -230 °C. The surface of Pluto is covered with ice, but not the same kind of ice that
is found on Earth. The ice that covers Pluto is believed to be made mostly of nitrogen.
Pluto also has a very thin atmosphere of nitrogen and methane which may freeze out
when Pluto moves further from the Sun.
Some powerful telescopes like the Hubble Space Telescope have observed some
seasonal changes as Pluto moved closer to the Sun and then moved further away, due to
the nature of its orbit around the Sun.

What is its moon like?

Pluto has one moon: Charon. Charon is about half the size of Pluto in length and, much
like Pluto, is believed to be covered with ice. Unlike Pluto, however, the ice covering
Charon is thought to be made of water rather than nitrogen. In Roman mythology Charon
ferried the shades of the dead across the river Lethe to the land of the dead.

How long is a day on this planet?

One day on Pluto is about 6.387 Earth days long. Like Uranus, Pluto also spins on its
side.

How long is a year on this planet?

One year on Pluto would be about 90,613 days or 248 years on earth!

What is it made of?

It is believed that Pluto is made mostly of rock and ice, although scientists will not be
sure until more research is done on the planet. With the discovery of Charon, a good
approximation of the average density of the planet can be determined, which can in turn
suggest what Pluto is not made out of. If Pluto were made out of heavy minerals and iron
like the planet Mercury, Pluto would have a very high density. Planets like Saturn are so
thin and tenuous that their average density is less than even water. Pluto is somewhere in
between, but more like some of the moons of the outer planets like Callisto or Triton,
which are known to have quite a bit of water ice.

How much would Pluto's gravity pull on me?

If you were on Pluto, it would pull you down with a force less than one tenth as strong as
Earth's gravity.

Who is it named after?

Pluto was named after the Roman god of the underworld.
Is Pluto really a planet?
Some scientists say that Pluto isn't really a planet. They say it is too small, and point out
that Charon (Pluto's satelite) is not much smaller than it. Some consider Pluto to be the
largest known Kuiper belt object. Also, Pluto has a pattern of orbit around the sun that is
different from other planets, and its orbit is affected somewhat by the gravitational pull of
the nearby planet Neptune. Many Kuiper belt objects have orbits like that.
 Kuiper Belt
The Kuiper belt extends from Neptune's orbit to three billion kilometers beyond it. It
contains lumps of icy material with organic compounds. That makes them like comets.
These lumps are called Kuiper belt objects or minor planets. The Kuiper belt may have
formed when the gravity of the young Jupiter sent the Kuiper belt objects out to where
they are now.

How big are the Kuiper belt objects?

Scientists consider Pluto to be the largest Kuiper belt object. It is 2390 km across. The
next largest known Kuiper belt object is Orcus, which is about 1600 km (1,000 miles)
across. Other large Kuiper belt objects about or over 1000 km across are Pluto's moon
Charon, Quaoar, Varuna, Ixion, 2002 TX300, 2002 UX25 and 2002 AW197; about as big
or bigger than Ceres, the largest asteroid.

How many are there?

By the year 2004 over 800 Kuiper belt objects had been found. Scientists think that there
are many more yet to be discovered, and some might be as big as Earth (though much
colder).

What are they named after?

After the first object in the belt was spotted from the Mauna Kea Observatory in Hawaii,
the belt was named after the astronomer Gerard Kuiper who in 1951 wrote that he
thought it existed very long ago. Astronmomers including Frederick Leonard, Kenneth
Edgeworth, and Julio Fernandez thought that the belt still existed; and some astronomers
call it the Edgeworth-Kuiper belt.
Orcus, Charon, and Varuna were named after gods of the underworld, and Ixion a
mythological person in the underworld. Quaoar was named after a creation god.
Oort Cloud
Oort Cloud Facts:
• The Oort cloud is the farthest
from the sun that you can go
and still be in the solar
system.
• It is believed that most comets
originally were in the Oort
Cloud before "falling" into the
Sun.

A Diagram showing approximately how far away the Oort Cloud might be in relation to
the planets of the Solar System

What is an Oort cloud?

Scientists think that there is a group of rocks and ice that forms a cloud-like region
surrounding our solar system. It is a collection of comet like objects orbiting far away
from the sun. It is named after a Dutch astronomer Jan Oort who refined and popularized
the theory.
Where is the Oort cloud?
The comets in the Oort cloud are at distances of 50 thousand to 100 thousand times the
distance between Earth and the sun. That is a thousand times further away from the sun
than Pluto is and about one fourth the distance to the nearest star. Light would take a year
to travel that far.

How did the Oort cloud start?

The Oort Cloud objects may have formed closer to the sun during the solar system's
formation. Then gas giants sent them far away with their gravity. They were sent in all
directions, making the Oort Cloud ball shaped instead of disk shaped. The gravity of
other stars made the objects' orbits more circular, making the objects stay far away from
the sun. Maybe the gravity of other stars could sometimes send the objects back toward
the sun. We would see them as comets.
One object discovered so far is Sedna. It is 1180 to 1800 km across. Its orbit stretches
from 76 to 928 times Earth's distance from the sun. Sedna takes about 11,250 Earth years
to orbit the sun once. The last time Sedna was where it is now in its orbit, Earth's last Ice
Age was ending! Some scientists consider it an inner Oort Cloud object. Others thinks
that it should be included in the Kuiper Belt, making the belt bigger.
 Glossary
A Glossary of words used in this book:
• Asteroid - a large rocky object that orbits a star, but is too small to be a planet.
• Astronomer - a person who studies stars and planets.
• Atmosphere
• Basalt Lava - molten basalt, a kind of rock.
• Carbon dioxide - a gas that animals breathe out and plants take in.
• Centaur
• Channel - a groove in the surface of something.
• Comet - a small icy object orbiting a star.
• Continent - a huge landmass on a planet.
• Core - the center of a planet or star.
• Crater - a hole in a planet's surface made by a meteorite falling on it.
• Crust - the outermost layer of a planet's surface.
• Energy - what you use to do work.
• Environment - the conditions on a planet.
• Equator - an imaginary line around a planet, perpendicular to the axis of rotation.
• Erosion
• Gas Giant - one of the four outer planets made out of giant balls of gas.
• Hemisphere - one half of a planet's surface.
• Lagrange point
• Lava - molten rock above a planet's surface.
• Mantle - a layer of molten rock below a planet's crust.
• Mass - the size of something.
• Meteor - a small or medium-size rock from space that has not entered a planet's
atmosphere yet.
• Methane - a gas that makes up most of the gas giants.
• Near Earth Asteroid
• Orbit - the path that an object takes around a larger object.
• Orbit System - a planet and its moons rotating around a star.
• Organic Compounds - compounds (collections of atoms) containing carbon.
• Planet - the celestial body that has a greater mass than all other objects of the same
orbit system together and that describes a well-defined, special orbit around a star.
• Radar - radio waves used to find distances to and make maps of things.
• Rotate - to turn on an axis.
• Scarp - a type of cliff.
• Silicate
• Surface Area - the area on the outside of something.
• Tectonic Plate
• Terrestrial Planets - the four planets closest to the Sun.
• Trojan asteroid
• Star - a huge ball of gas that produces light itself.
• Volcanic - something that relates to volcanoes.
• Volume - the size of an object.
GNU Free Documentation License
Version 1.2, November 2002
Copyright (C) 2000,2001,2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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must delete all sections Entitled "Endorsements."
6. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other documents released
under this License, and replace the individual copies of this License in the various
documents with a single copy that is included in the collection, provided that you follow
the rules of this License for verbatim copying of each of the documents in all other
respects.
You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute it individually
under this License, provided you insert a copy of this License into the extracted
document, and follow this License in all other respects regarding verbatim copying of that
document.
7. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independent
documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an
"aggregate" if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the legal
rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual works permit. When the
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the aggregate which are not themselves derivative works of the Document.
If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these copies of the Document,
then if the Document is less than one half of the entire aggregate, the Document's Cover
Texts may be placed on covers that bracket the Document within the aggregate, or the
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8. TRANSLATION
Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may distribute translations of the
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English version of this License and the original versions of those notices and disclaimers.
In case of a disagreement between the translation and the original version of this License
or a notice or disclaimer, the original version will prevail.
If a section in the Document is Entitled "Acknowledgements", "Dedications", or
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require changing the actual title.
9. TERMINATION
You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except as expressly
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10. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions of the GNU Free
Documentation License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spirit to
the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. See
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Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version number. If the Document
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you may choose any version ever published (not as a draft) by the Free Software
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How to use this License for your documents
To use this License in a document you have written, include a copy of the License in the
document and put the following copyright and license notices just after the title page:
Copyright (c) YEAR YOUR NAME.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this
document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2
or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-
Cover
Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
entitled "GNU
Free Documentation License".

If you have Invariant Sections, Front-Cover Texts and Back-Cover Texts, replace the
"with...Texts." line with this:
with the Invariant Sections being LIST THEIR TITLES, with the
Front-Cover Texts being LIST, and with the Back-Cover Texts being
LIST.

If you have Invariant Sections without Cover Texts, or some other combination of the
three, merge those two alternatives to suit the situation.
If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we recommend releasing
these examples in parallel under your choice of free software license, such as the GNU
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