Across
- 3. The velocity a body must be at to escape or leave the gravitational pull of another planet or object.
- 5. Is dark blue, Neptune is one of two ice giants in the outer solar system (the other is Uranus). Most (80% or more) of the planet's mass is made up of a hot dense fluid of "icy" materials - water, methane, and ammonia - above a small, rocky core. Of the giant planets, Neptune is the densest.
- 7. Smallest planet, closest to the sun, terrestrial. Approximately 36 million miles (58 million km), 0.39 AU away from the sun. Temperatures get as high as 700 K and as low as 100 K; highly elliptical orbit. It has a very thin atmosphere composed of oxygen, hydrogen, helium, sodium, and potassium. Surface features include Caloris Basin (aka Caloris Planitia), Borealis Planitia (plain), Rembrandt (basin), Tir Basin When Mercury's hot core cooled and shrank, ridges formed called rupes.
- 8. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction
- 12. The orbit of a planet is always an ellipse. The distance between the planet and the sun is constantly changing
- 13. A gaseous planet, the fifth planet from the sun, largest planet. Jupiter is made up of different belts and regions. Lighter colored stripes are zones and darker stripes are belts. These zones and belts circulate the planet in opposite directions due to convection in Jupiter's atmosphere. Turbulence in Jupiter's atmosphere (which is composed of hydrogen and helium) causes storms like the Great Red Spot. Jupiter doesn't really have a surface, the atmosphere just leads to a liquid layer. There isn't much of a mantle either, just liquid metallic hydrogen. It is not 100% known whether Jupiter has a core or not.
- 14. Is 4.603 billion years old. It was formed when gravity pulled swirling gas and dust together
- 18. An object at rest stays at rest unless acted on by an outside force. An object in motion stays in motion unless acted on by an outside force.
- 19. The planet we live on. Has the moon.
- 20. Is the smallest of the terrestrial worlds and was internally active until about 3.3 billion years ago when its major volcanism ceased.
Down
- 1. When a planet is orbiting a star, its gravity can pull on the star slightly and cause it to "wobble". This affects the light that astronomers observe from the star because of what is called the doppler effect. Essentially, if the star is closer the light waves are closer and appear bluer in color, and when the star is farther away the light waves are more spread out and appear redder in color
- 2. Force equals mass times acceleration. (F=ma)
- 4. The rate at which a planet sweeps out area is the product of its transverse velocity and distance from the sun
- 6. Is light blue, The standard model of Uranus's structure is that it consists of three layers: a rocky (silicate/iron-nickel) core in the center, an icy mantle in the middle, and an outer gaseous hydrogen/helium envelope.
- 9. How most known exoplanets were discovered, a transit occurs when a planet crosses between a star and its observer. When an exoplanet crosses in front of its star, it very slightly dims the star which can be seen in light curves. These light curve graphs can also be used to determine the planet's orbit, size, and atmosphere composition.
- 10. The square of the orbital period is directly proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis of the orbit
- 11. Is a very light brown grayish color, Pluto is about two-thirds the diameter of Earth's Moon and probably has a rocky core surrounded by a mantle of water ice. Interesting ices like methane and nitrogen frost coat the surface. Due to its lower density, Pluto's mass is about one-sixth that of Earth's Moon.
- 15. looks like two asteroids stuck together, its nicknames are 486958 and 1110113Y. Images from New Horizons show that Arrokoth is a bi-lobed contact binary. This means it's two objects that began orbiting each other until they somehow gently merged. The strange shape of Arrokoth, unlike any object previously visited, was the biggest surprise of the New Horizons spacecraft's flyby.
- 16. 3rd smallest, 2nd closest to the sun, terrestrial planet. Venus is the hottest planet due to the greenhouse effect and a dense atmosphere of carbon dioxide and clouds of sulfuric acid. Features on Venus: Ishtar Terra (a rocky highland), Aphrodite Terra (highland), Sacajawea (volcanic crater/caldera on Ishtar Terra) Diana (Deep canyon). Pancake Domes: domes with flat tops and steep sides formed from the extrusion of highly viscous lava. Tick Domes: volcanoes with radiating spurs, Tesserae: terrain with grooves and patterns caused by heat.
- 17. The 6th planet from the sun, 2nd largest, and a gaseous planet. It is the least dense planet, and would actually be able to float in water. Most likely has an iron core surrounded by liquid metallic hydrogen. It has an atmosphere of hydrogen, helium, and other trace gasses like methane and ammonia. Saturn's rings are composed of particles of varying sizes of water ice. These particles are kept in line by Saturn's moons such as Atlas, Prometheus, and Pandora. The three main rings are A, B, and C, and the division between rings A and B is called the Cassini Division. The clouds visible on Saturn are mostly ammonia ice, with water farther down. Saturn has 60 known moons.