Space Physics 🌌 Flashcards
What are the main features of our solar system?
The sun
The eight planets
The moons
Asteroids
Comets
What do the planets orbit in our solar system and what type of orbit is it?
The planets orbit the sun in an elliptical orbit.
What is the Sun?
The Sun is the largest object in the solar system and was the first to form.
The Sun’s huge gravitational field keeps many other objects - planets, dwarf planets, asteroids and comets - in orbit around it.
The Sun alone contains 99.8% of the total mass in the solar system.
What are the planets in order from the sun?
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Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.
What are the 2 groups of planets?
The rocky planets - the four inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars), which are small, rocky, dense planets, close to the Sun;
The Gaseous planets- the four outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune), which are large balls of gas, far from the Sun. They are called the gas giants.
The 2 groups of planets are separated by the asteroid belt.
What is a satellite?
It is a body orbiting a planet.
There are 2 different types:
Natural satellites- moons are natural satellites.
Artificial satellites - satellites are artificial satellites.
What are asteroids?
Asteroids are made of metals and rocky material.
There are large numbers of asteroids orbiting the Sun in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
They are up to 1000km in diameter.
What is a comet?
Comets are similar to asteroids, but are made of ice, dust and rocky material.
As a comet approaches the Sun, it begins to vaporise, which means that it turns into a gas.
It then produces a distinctive tail.
What are comets?
Comets are made of ice, dust and rocky material. They orbit the sun in an elliptical orbit.
What does gravity provide?
It provides the force needed for the orbital motion of planets, comets, moons and
artificial satellites.
What are the uses of artificial satellites? (X4)
Weather forecasting.
Astronomy.
Communications.
Observation of the Earth.
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How does a star form?
Stars form from massive clouds of dust and hydrogen gas in space.
Gravity pulls the dust and hydrogen gas together.
As the gas falls together, it gets hot.
A star forms when it is hot enough for a nuclear fusion reaction to start.
This releases energy and keeps the star hot.
Smaller masses may also form and be attracted by a larger mass to become planets.
What does light from stars show?
Light from stars, including our Sun, show that:
they are composed mainly of hydrogen
and helium.
their energy is supplied by the fusion of hydrogen into helium.
How are naturally occurring elements formed?
All naturally occurring elements, apart from Hydrogen, are formed by nuclear fusion in stars.
What is the life cycle of a star with similar mass to our Sun?
Protostar - As the mass falls together it gets hot. A star is formed when it is hot enough for the hydrogen nuclei to fuse together to make helium. The fusion process releases energy, which keeps the core of the star hot.
Main sequence - During this stable phase in the life of a star, the outward force of thermal expansion is balanced by the inward force of gravity. The Sun is at this stable phase in its life.
Red giant - When all the hydrogen has been used up in the fusion process, larger nuclei begin to form and the star may expand to become a red giant.
White dwarf - When all the nuclear reactions are over, a small star like the Sun may begin to contract under the pull of gravity. In this instance, the star becomes a white dwarf which fades and changes colour as it cools.
Black dwarf.
