Space

and

its

planets

What is Space?

In space there are lots of different sizes of rocks falling off planets. We call these meteorites. That is not the only thing we call them, when we see a shooting star that is a meteorite.

There are many features which go together to form what we know as space. These include meteorites, stars, comets, the sun, moons and the planets.

More things on SpaceDifferent planets have got a different amounts of moons. Uranus has 27 moons - 5 big moons and 22 little moons! Amazing!

Ten of Uranus’s moons

The SunThe sun is the nearest star to us and it is the centre of our solar system. It is a huge ball of incredibly hot gas and is 1.4 million kilometres wide, also it weighs as much as 330 000 Earths.

Although the sun seems small to us, this is because it lies 150 million kilometres away. Yet it is so hot it provides us with heat and gives off ultraviolet light, which causes sun burn.

The Solar System

There are 9 planets which form the solar system. They are named after some of the Greek Gods and all orbit the sun. The nearest to the sun is called Mercury. This is followed by Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto being the furthest distance from the sun.

The Planet I Researched My favourite planet is Uranus, this is because it is the third biggest planet in the solar system and I like the colour which is caused by frozen ammonia crystals and methane.

It is a giant gas planet with a centre core of minus 220 Degrees Celsius, 32 times colder than the average on Earth!

UranusUranus is the seventh planet from the sun, it was found by Sir William Herschel, and he found it on 13th March 1981. It is the seventh planet in the Solar System.

Unlike other planets, Uranus spins on it’s side. One theory is that it was hit by a large object whilst others believe that the gravitational pull of a moon tilted it on its side.

A year on Uranus is equal to 84.01 earth year. One day is just over 17 earth hours!

In 1986 Voyager 2 became the only spacecraft to have visited Uranus and collected most of the images and information we have on the planet.

There are 13 rings around Uranus which are named using Greek symbols and numerical values.

The moons of Uranus are named after characters in Shakespeare’s plays and a poem by Alexander Pope.

Fascinating facts

Uranus in FilmsThere was a film called “Uranus” made in 1990 starring a French actor Philippe Noiret. In it he has a persistent dream where he wakes every night feeling the weight of Uranus bearing down on him, carrying despair.

In the 1962 film Journey to the Seventh Planet, astronauts on Uranus meet a strange intelligence that projects illusions of a beautiful woman.

Uranus in Fiction

• In the Buck Rogers series Uranus had biodomes and robots!

• In “Doctor Who” Uranus is described as the only place in the universe that the mineral Taranium can be found.

Fun Space Quiz

• What is another word for the solar system? The Universe

• How many planets are in the solar system? Nine Planets

• Uranus is what type of planet? A Gas Planet

• What is another name for a shooting star? A Meteorite