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Chapter 2
The Solar System
Observing the Solar System
• Planets: “Wandering Star”
• Greeks Ideas: We lived in a Geocentric system. (Earth is in the center of solar system)
Copernicus’s Idea
• 1500’s
• Heliocentric System – Earth and other planets revolve around the sun.
• Galileo used telescope to prove heliocentric system idea.
Brahe and Kepler’s Law
• Orbit of each planet is an ellipse.
Issac Newton
• Inertia and gravity keep planets in orbit.– Inertia – a moving object continues in a straight
line .– Gravity – keeps planet in an orbit
The Sun
• Interior of the sun1. Nuclear fusion of H-
sun’s energy comes from
2. 5 billion years of fuel left
Sun’s Atmosphere
• 3 layers:• 3. Photosphere: inner
layer, light comes from
• 2. Chromosphere – reddish glow seen during an eclipse
• 6. Corona - outermost
Solar Wind
• Corona sends out stream of charged particles
• Creates Auroras (Aurora Borealis)
Antarctica:
Features of the sun
• Sunspots – dark spots on sun, areas of gas that are cooler than the rest of the sun.
Prominences
• Reddish loops of gas link sunspot regions
Solar Flares
• Explosions due to prominences connecting
• Increase solar wind – magnetic storms
Other objects in Solar System
• Comets: “dirty snowball”
• Orbits are long and narrow
• 3 parts of a comet: – Tail –
– Nucleus –
– Coma -
Orbit of a comet
Asteroids
• Too small to be planets
• Belt between Mars and Jupiter
• Discovered about 10,000 asteroids
• Impact Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico
Meteors
. Meteoroid: chunk of rock or dust in space.
• Meteor: A streak of light in the sky produced by the burning of a meteoroid in Earth’s atmosphere
• Meteorites: meteoroids that pass through the Earth’s atmosphere and hit the Earth’s surfaceMeteor crater in Arizona
A bright meteor 1998 , Florida