Surface Temperature of the

Inner and Outer Planets

By: Neuhart Zerin Dawn Gementiza
 What is a planet?
A planet is a celestial body that orbits a star.
Planets are smaller than stars, and they do
not produce light. 

A planet must do three things: it must

orbit a star, it must be big enough
to have enough gravity to force
a spherical shape, and it must be big enough
that its gravity cleared away any objects of a
similar size near its orbit.
 Thre are two groups of Planets
In our Solar System, astronomers often divide the planets
into two groups — the inner planets and the outer planets.
The inner planets are closer to the Sun and are smaller and
rockier. The outer planets are further away, larger and made
up mostly of gas

The inner planets (in order of distance from the sun, closest
to furthest) are Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. After an
asteroid belt comes the outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus
and Neptune. The interesting thing is, in some other
planetary systems discovered, the gas giants are actually
quite close to the sun.
 Inner Planets
• The four inner planets are called terrestrial
planets because their surfaces are solid (and,
as the name implies, somewhat similar to
Earth — although the term can be misleading
because each of the four has vastly different
environments). They’re made up mostly of
heavy metals such as iron and nickel, and have
either no moons or few moons. Based
on this information from NASA.
 Mercury
The smallest planet in our solar system and
nearest to the Sun, Mercury is only slightly
larger than Earth's Moon. From the surface of
Mercury, the Sun would appear more than
three times as large as it does when viewed
from Earth, and the sunlight would be as much
as seven times brighter. Despite its proximity to
the Sun, Mercury is not the hottest planet in
our solar system – that title belongs to nearby
Venus, thanks to its dense atmosphere.

During the day, temperatures on Mercury's

surface can reach 800 degrees
Fahrenheit (430 degrees Celsius). Because
the planet has no atmosphere to retain that
heat, nighttime temperatures on the surface
can drop to minus 290 degrees
Fahrenheit (minus 180 degrees Celsius).
 Venus
Although it is the second planet from the sun, Venus is
the hottest planet in the solar system. The reason
Venus is hotter than even Mercury is not because of its
position in the solar system but because of its thick,
dense cloud layer.
Venus is the planet most similar to the Earth in terms of size
and mass, but its atmosphere causes huge differences in the
temperatures of the two planets. The distance to
Venus from the sun plays only a small role in the cause of its
elevated heat wave.

The average temperature on Venus is 864 degrees Fahrenheit

(462 degrees Celsius). Temperature changes slightly traveling through the
atmosphere, growing cooler farther away from the surface. Lead would melt
on the surface of the planet, where the temperature is around 872 F (467
C).
 Earth
Earth is the only place in our Solar System
where life can – and does – exist on the
surface.
This is due to a number of factors, which
include Earth’s position relative to the Sun.
Being in the “Goldilocks Zone” and the
existence of an atmosphere (and
magnetosphere), Earth is able to maintain a
stable average temperature on its surface that
The average surface temperature allows for the existence of warm, flowing water
on Earth is approximately 14°C; on its surface, and conditions favorable to life.
but as already noted, this varies.
For instance, the hottest
temperature ever recorded on These measurements were part of a global
Earth was 70.7°C (159°F), which temperature survey conducted by scientists at 
was taken in the Lut Desert of NASA’s Earth Observatory during the summers of
Iran. 2003 to 2009. For five of the seven years surveyed
(2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2009) the Lut Desert
was the hottest spot on Earth.
 Mars
Mars is one of themost explored bodies in our solar
system, and it's the only planet where we've sent
rovers to roam the alien landscape. NASA currently
has three spacecraft in orbit, one rover and one
lander on the surface and another rover under
construction here on Earth.

Mars's atmosphere is about 100 times thinner than Earth's. Without a "thermal
blanket," Mars can't retain any heat energy. On average, the temperature on
Mars is about minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 60 degrees Celsius). In
winter, near the poles temperatures can get down to minus 195 degrees F
(minus 125 degrees C). A summer day on Mars may get up to 70 degrees F
(20 degrees C) near the equator, but at night the temperature can plummet to
about minus 100 degrees F (minus 73 C). 
 Outer Planets
• The outer planets (sometimes called Jovian planets
or gas giants) are huge planets swaddled in gas.
They all have rings and all of plenty of moons each.
Despite their size, only two of them are visible
without telescopes: Jupiter and Saturn. Uranus
and Neptune were the first planets discovered
since antiquity, and showed astronomers the solar
system was bigger than previously thought. 
Based on this information from NASA.
 Jupiter
Jupiter is made up predominantly of hydrogen,
with some helium. Small traces of other gases
also contribute to the planet's composition.
These gases fill the entire planet, descending
all the way to the core. The surface, as
identified by scientists, is the region where the
pressure is equal to that at the surface of Earth,
one bar.

The temperature in the clouds of Jupiter is about minus 145 degrees Celsius
(minus 234 degrees Fahrenheit). The temperature near the planet's center is
much, much hotter. The core temperature may be about 24,000 degrees
Celsius (43,000 degrees Fahrenheit). That’s hotter than the surface of the
sun!
 Saturn
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun
and the second largest planet in our solar
system. Adorned with a dazzling system
of icy rings, Saturn is unique among the
planets. 
As a gas giant, Saturn doesn’t have a
Saturn is a gaseous world and doesn't true surface. The planet is mostly swirling
have a surface, but at the top level of gases and liquids deeper down. The
its clouds, the temperature remains a extreme pressures and temperatures
steady minus 178 degrees Celsius deep inside the planet crush, melt and
(minus 288 degrees Fahrenheit) vaporize spacecraft trying to fly into the
throughout the year. Horizontal planet.
variations exist, owing to high winds
that blow at speeds as fast as 1,800 . In 2004, however, astronomers at the Keck
kilometers per hour (1,118 miles per Observatory in Hawaii discovered a vortex at the
hour), but the temperature varies little tip of the south pole with a temperature in the
with latitude range of minus 122 degrees Celsius (minus 188
degrees Fahrenheit).
 Uranus

The seventh planet from the sun, Uranus has the

coldest atmosphere of any of the planets in the
solar system, even though it is not the most
distant. Despite the fact that its equator faces
away from the sun, the temperature distribution
on Uranus is much like other planets, with a
warmer equator and cooler poles.

The dense troposphere, which contains the planet's clouds, is frigid at minus
243 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 153 degrees Celsius) to minus 370 F (minus
218 C), making it the coldest atmosphere in the solar system. Warmed by the
sun and radiation from space, the troposphere has slightly higher temperatures
of minus 370 F (minus 218 C) to minus 243 F (minus 153 C). The outer layer
can get was hot as 1,070 F (577 C).
 Neptune
It is in this environment that we find Neptune, the Solar
System’s most distance (and hence most cold) planet.
While this gas/ice giant has no “surface” to speak of,
Earth-based research and flybys have been conducted
that have managed to obtain accurate measurements of
the temperature in the planet’s upper atmosphere. All
told, the planet experiences temperatures that range
from approximately 55 K (-218 °C; -360 °F) to 72 K (-200
°C; -328 °F), making it the coldest planet in the Solar
System.

But as with all gas and ice giants, temperatures vary on Neptune due to depth and
pressure. In short, the deeper one goes into Neptune, the hotter it becomes. At its core,
Neptune reaches temperatures of up to 7273 K (7000 °C; 12632 °F), which is comparable
to the surface of the Sun. The huge temperature differences between Neptune’s center
and its surface create huge wind storms, which can reach as high as 2,100 km/hour,
making them the fastest in the Solar System.