Solar system

The eight planets

 Mercury
• Mercury is the smallest planet in the solar
system and the closest to the Sun. Its orbit
around the Sun takes 87.97 Earth days, the
shortest of all the Sun's planets. It is named
after the Roman god Mercurius (Mercury),
god of commerce, messenger of the gods,
and mediator between gods and mortals,
corresponding to the Greek god Hermes.
Like Venus, Mercury orbits the Sun within
Earth's orbit as an inferior planet, and
its apparent distance from the Sun as
viewed from Earth never exceeds 28°.
 Venus

• Venus is the second planet from the

Sun, orbiting it the closest to Earth. It is
sometimes called Earth's "sister" or
"twin" planet as it is almost as large and
has a similar composition. Venus, like
Mercury, appears in Earth's sky never
far from the Sun, either as morning
star or evening star with a synodic
period of 1.6 years. It is, after the Moon,
the brightest natural object in Earth's
sky, capable of casting visible shadows
on Earth at dark conditions and being
visible to the naked eye in broad
sunlight
 Earth
• Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the
only astronomical object known to harbor life. While
large volumes of water can be found throughout
the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface
water. About 71% of Earth's surface is made up of the
ocean, dwarfing Earth's polar ice, lakes, and rivers. The
remaining 29% of Earth's surface is land, consisting of
continents and islands. Earth's surface layer is formed of
several slowly moving tectonic plates, interacting to
produce mountain ranges, volcanoes, and earthquakes.
Earth's liquid outer core generates the magnetic field
that shapes Earth's magnetosphere, deflecting
destructive solar winds .
 Mars
• Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the
second-smallest planet in the Solar System,
being larger than only Mercury. In the English
language, Mars is named for the Roman god of
war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a
thin atmosphere (less than 1% that of Earth's),
and has a crust primarily composed of
elements similar to Earth's crust, as well as a
core made of iron and nickel. Mars has surface
features such as impact craters, valleys, dunes,
and polar ice caps. It has two small and
irregularly shaped moons: Phobos and Deimos.
 Jupiter
• Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun
and the largest in the Solar System. It is a
gas giant with a mass more than two and
a half times that of all the other planets in
the Solar System combined, but slightly
less than one-thousandth the mass of the
Sun. Jupiter is the third brightest natural
object in the Earth's night sky after
the Moon and Venus, and it has been
observed since prehistoric times. It was
named after the Roman god Jupiter, the
king of the gods.
 Saturn
• Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the
second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It
is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine
and a half times that of Earth .It has only one-
eighth the average density of Earth; however, with
its larger volume, Saturn is over 95 times more
massive .Saturn's interior is most likely composed
of a core of iron–nickel and rock (silicon and oxygen
compounds). Its core is surrounded by a deep layer
of metallic hydrogen, an intermediate layer of
liquid hydrogen and liquid helium, and finally, a
gaseous outer layer. Saturn has a pale yellow hue
due to ammonia crystals in its upper atmosphere.
An electrical current within the metallic hydrogen
layer is thought to give rise to Saturn's
planetary magnetic field, which is weaker than
Earth's, but which has a magnetic moment 580
times that of Earth due to Saturn's larger size
 Uranus
• Uranus is the seventh planet from the
Sun. Its name is a reference to the Greek
god of the sky, Uranus (Caelus), who,
according to Greek mythology, was the
great-grandfather of Ares (Mars),
grandfather of Zeus (Jupiter) and father
of Cronus (Saturn). It has the third-largest
planetary radius and fourth-largest
planetary mass in the Solar System.
Uranus is similar in composition
to Neptune, and both have bulk chemical
compositions which differ from that of
the larger gas giants Jupiter and Saturn.
For this reason, scientists often classify
Uranus and Neptune as "ice giants" to
distinguish them from the other giant
planets.
 Neptune
• Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the farthest
known solar planet. In the Solar System, it is the fourth-
largest planet by diameter, the third-most-massive planet,
and the densest giant planet. It is 17 times the mass
of Earth, and slightly more massive than its near-twin
Uranus. Neptune is denser and physically smaller than
Uranus because its greater mass causes more gravitational
compression of its atmosphere. It is referred to as one of the
solar system's two ice giant planets (the other one being
Uranus). Being composed primarily of gases and liquids, it
has no well-defined "solid surface". The planet orbits the
Sun once every 164.8 years at an average distance of 30.1
AU (4.5 billion km; 2.8 billion mi).