Minor Members of the Solar System

COMETS
What exactly are comets?
Comets are icy celestial bodies that are
formed in the outer regions of the Solar
System.

They are a chunk of ice, gas, and dust that

orbits the sun in a long, narrow, elliptical orbit
COMETS
Parts of a COMET
• Coma – glowing head that forms as
the gases escape the comet’s weak
gravity and drag away dust particles.
• Diameter – 100000 km
 Parts of a COMET

• Tail – the extension of the coma

• Plasma/ion tail is the result of the interaction
of ion particles with the sunlight.
• Dust tail consists of small solid particles
 Parts of a COMET

• Nucleus – has an icy composition,

but is not packed solidly; it has
empty spaces.
COMETS
What exactly are sungrazers?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=d2TgJP46Ayw
 Origin of a COMET
Kuiper belt – Located beyond the
orbit of Neptune.
- has 100000 comets
- orbits the sun in the
same plane and direction
as the planets
Oort Cloud – about 50000 AU
away from the sun.
- contains one trillion
comets
- comets are formed near
the Jovian planets
Long Period Comets
have an orbital return period in less than
200 years.

Short-period Comets
return in less than 200 years.
COMETS
Long-period Comet

Comet Hale-Bopp Short-period Comet

Halley’s Comet
 Meteoroids, Meteors, and Meteorites
Meteoroids are small chunks
of rock and debris in space.
Meteors are streak of light
seen when a meteoroid heats
up in the atmosphere.
Meteorite are meteor
fragment that reaches the
ground.
Orionid Meteor
Classification of Meteorites according to
its composition.

Iron meteorites Stony meteorites Stony-iron meteorites

Impact crater when meteorite collide with
Earth’s surface

Barringer Crater in Arizona, USA has a diameter of 1.2 km km

Asteroids (Planetoids)
• Asteroids are chunk of rocks that orbit
the sun in the same direction as the
planets.
• They are rocky remains from the early
days of the solar system.
• Ceres is the first and largest asteroid to
be discovered .
• It is composed of metals, such as gold
and platinum
• They do not emit their own light; they
only reflect sunlight.
• Asteroid has elliptical orbits
Origin of Asteroids