THE SOLAR SYSTEM

HOW MANY PLANETS ARE THERE

IN A SOLAR SYSTEM
There are eight planet :
1. Mercury - Elemental or metallic mercury
2. Venus - Earth's twin
3. Earth – Water planet
4. Mars - The Red Planet
5. Jupiter -G giant planet
6. Saturn - The Jewel of the Solar System
7. Uranus - The seventh planet from the Sun
8. Neptune – The Blue Giant

WE WILL LEARN MORE ABOUT THIS IN NEXT

SLIDE
 MERCURY

• Mercury is the first planet from the Sun and the smallest in the Solar System. It is a terrestrial planet with a heavily cratered
surface due to overlapping impact events. These features are well preserved since the planet has no geological activity and an
extremely tenuous atmosphere called an exosphere. Despite being the smallest planet in the Solar System with a mean diameter
of 4,880 km (3,030 mi), 38% of that of Earth, Mercury is dense enough to have roughly the same surface gravity as Mars.
Mercury has a dynamic magnetic field with a strength about 1% of that of Earth's and has no natural satellites.
• According to current models, Mercury may have a solid silicate crust and mantle overlying a solid outer core, a deeper liquid
core layer, and a solid inner core. Having almost no atmosphere to retain heat, Mercury has surface temperatures that change
wildly during the day, ranging from 100 K (−173 °C; −280 °F) at night to 700 K (427 °C; 800 °F) during sunlight across the
equator regions.
• At Mercury's poles there are large reservoirs of water ices that are never exposed to direct sunlight, which has an estimated
mass of about 0.025–0.25% the Antarctic ice sheet. eweeeThere are many competing hypotheses about Mercury's origins and
development, some of which incorporate collision with planetesimal and rock vaporization.
• Because Mercury is very close to the Sun, the intensity of sunlight on its surface is between 4.59 and 10.61 times the Sun's
typical energy received by the Earth: the solar constant.
 VENUS
• Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is a rocky planet with the densest atmosphere of all the rocky bodies in the
Solar System, and the only one with a mass and size that is close to that of its orbital neighbour Earth. Orbiting inferiorly
(inside of Earth's orbit), it appears in Earth's sky always close to the Sun, as either a "morning star" or an "evening star". While
this is also true for Mercury, Venus appears much more prominently, since it is the third brightest object in Earth's sky after the
Moon and the Sunappearing brighter than any other star-like classical planet or any fixed star. With such prominence in Earth's
sky, Venus has historically been a common and important object for humans, in both their cultures and astronomy.
• Venus has a weak induced magnetosphere and an especially thick carbon dioxide atmosphere, which creates, together with its
global sulfuric acid cloud cover, an extreme greenhouse effect. This results at the surface in a mean temperature of 737 K
(464 °C; 867 °F) and a crushing pressure of 92 times that of Earth's at sea level, turning the air into a supercritical fluid, while
at cloudy altitudes of 50 km (30 mi) above the surface, the pressure, temperature and also radiation are very much like at
Earth's surface. Conditions possibly favourable for life on Venus have been identified at its cloud layers, with recent research
having found indicative, but not convincing, evidence of life on the planet.
• Venus may have had liquid surface water early in its history, possibly enough to form oceans, but runaway greenhouse effects
eventually evaporated any water, which then was taken into space by the solar wind.
 EARTH
• Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being a
water world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all of Earth's water is contained in its
global ocean, covering 70.8% of Earth's crust. The remaining 29.2% of Earth's crust is land, most of which is located in the
form of continental landmasses within one hemisphere, Earth's land hemisphere. Most of Earth's land is somewhat humid and
covered by vegetation, while large sheets of ice at Earth's polar deserts retain more water than Earth's groundwater, lakes, rivers
and atmospheric water combined. Earth's crust consists of slowly moving tectonic plates, which interact to produce mountain
ranges, volcanoes, and earthquakes. Earth has a liquid outer core that generates a magnetosphere capable of deflecting most of
the destructive solar winds and cosmic radiation.
• Earth has a dynamic atmosphere, which sustains Earth's surface conditions and protects it from most meteoroids and
UV-light at entry. It has a composition of primarily nitrogen and oxygen. Water vapor is widely present in the atmosphere,
forming clouds that cover most of the planet. The water vapor acts as a greenhouse gas and, together with other greenhouse
gases in the atmosphere, particularly carbon dioxide (CO2), creates the conditions for both liquid surface water and water vapor
to persist via the capturing of energy from the Sun's light.
• This process maintains the current average surface temperature of 14.76 °C, at which water is liquid under atmospheric
pressure.
 MARS
• Mars is the fourth planet and the furthest terrestrial planet from the Sun. The reddish color of its surface is due to finely
grained iron(III) oxide dust in the soil, giving it the nickname "the Red Planet".[21][22] Mars's radius is second smallest among
the planets in the Solar System at 3,389.5 km (2,106 mi). The Martian dichotomy is visible on the surface: on average, the
terrain on Mars's northern hemisphere is flatter and lower than its southern hemisphere. Mars has a thin atmosphere made
primarily of carbon dioxide, and two irregularly shaped natural satellites, Phobos and Deimos.
• Geologically, Mars is fairly active, with dust devils sweeping across the landscape and marsquakes (Martian analog to
earthquakes) trembling underneath the ground. The surface of Mars hosts a large shield volcano (Olympus Mons) and one of
the largest canyons in the Solar System (Valles Marineris). Mars's significant orbital eccentricity and axial tilt cause large
seasonal changes to the polar ice caps' coverage and temperature swings between −110 °C (−166 °F) to 35 °C (95 °F) on the
surface. A Martian solar day (sol) is equal to 24.5 hours and a Martian solar year is equal to 1.88 Earth years.
• Like the other planets in the Solar System, Mars was formed approximately 4.5 billion years ago. During the Noachian period
from about 4.1 to 3.7 billion years ago, Mars's surface was marked by meteor impacts, valley formation, erosion, and the
possible presence of water oceans. The Hesperian period from 3.7 to 3.2–2 billion years ago was dominated by widespread
volcanic activity and flooding that carved immense outflow channels. The Amazonian period, which continues to the present,
was marked by the wind's influence on geological processes. It is unknown whether life has ever existed on Mars.
 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, and slightly less than one one-thousandth the mass of the
Sun. Jupiter orbits the Sun at a distance of 5.20 AU (778.5 Gm) with an orbital period of 11.86 years. 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 Jupiter, the chief deity of ancient Roman religion.
• Jupiter was the first planet to form, and its inward migration during the primordial Solar System impacted much of the
formation history of the other planets. Jupiter is primarily composed of hydrogen (90% by volume), followed by helium, which
makes up a quarter of its mass and a tenth of its volume. The ongoing contraction of Jupiter's interior generates more heat than
the planet receives from the Sun. Its internal structure is believed to comprise an outer mantle of liquid metallic hydrogen, and a
diffuse inner core of denser material. Because of its rapid rotation rate of 1 rotation per 10 hours, Jupiter's shape is an
oblate spheroid: it has a slight but noticeable bulge around the equator.
• The outer atmosphere is divided into a series of latitudinal bands, with turbulence and storms along their interacting
boundaries. The most obvious result of this is the Great Red Spot, a giant storm which has been observed since 1831 and
possibly earlier.
 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, but is over 95
times more massive.
• Saturn's interior is thought to be composed of a rocky core, 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. Saturn's magnetic field strength is around one-twentieth of Jupiter's.The outer atmosphere is generally
bland and lacking in contrast, although long-lived features can appear. Wind speeds on Saturn can reach 1,800 kilometres per
hour (1,100 miles per hour).
• The planet has a prominent ring system, which is composed mainly of ice particles, with a smaller amount of rocky debris and
dust. At least 146 moons[32] are known to orbit the planet, of which 63 are officially named; this does not include the hundreds
of moonlets in its rings. Titan, Saturn's largest moon and the second largest in the Solar System, is larger (while less massive)
than the planet Mercury and is the only moon in the Solar System to have a substantial atmosphere.
 URANUS
• Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gaseous cyan-coloured ice giant. Most of the planet is made of water,
ammonia, and methane in a supercritical phase of matter, which in astronomy is called 'ice' or volatiles. The planet's atmosphere
has a complex layered cloud structure and has the lowest minimum temperature of 49 K (−224 °C; −371 °F) out of all the
Solar System's planets. It has a marked axial tilt of 97.8° with a retrograde rotation rate of 17 hours. This means that in an 84-
Earth-year orbital period around the Sun, its poles get around 42 years of continuous sunlight, followed by 42 years of
continuous darkness.
• Uranus has the third-largest diameter and fourth-largest mass among the Solar System's planets. Based on current models,
inside its volatile mantle layer is a rocky core, and surrounding it is a thick hydrogen and helium atmosphere. Trace amounts of
hydrocarbons (thought to be produced via hydrolysis) and carbon monoxide along with carbon dioxide (thought to have been
originated from comets) have been detected in the upper atmosphere. There are many unexplained
climate phenomena in Uranus's atmosphere, such as its peak wind speed of 900 km/h (560 mph. variations in its polar cap and
its erratic cloud formation. The planet also has very low internal heat compared to other giant planets, which is still
unexplained.
• Like the other giant planets, Uranus has a ring system, orbiting natural satellites and a magnetosphere.
 NEPTUNE
• Neptune is the eighth and farthest planet from the Sun. It is the
fourth-largest planet in the Solar System 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.
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 orbital distance of 30.1 astronomical units (4.5 billion kilometres; 2.8 billion miles). It is
named after the Roman god of the sea and has the astronomical symbol , representing Neptune's trident.

• Neptune is not visible to the unaided eye and is the only planet in the Solar System found by mathematical
predictions rather than by empirical observation.

• Unexpected changes in the orbit of Uranus led Alexis Bouvard to hypothesise that its orbit was subject to
gravitational perturbation by an unknown planet. After Bouvard's death, the position of Neptune was predicted from
his observations, independently, by John Couch Adams and Urbain Le Verrier.