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Astronomy > Unit 6: The outer Planets > Flashcards

Unit 6: The outer Planets Flashcards

1
Q

How big is Jupiter

A

318 earth masses

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2
Q

Explain the movement of Jupiters Clouds (Belts and Zones)

A
  • Jupiters clouds move in east-west bands
  • reddish-coloured belts alternate with white-coloured zones
  • against the background of the zones and belts, we see turbulent swirling cloud patterns (ovals)
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3
Q

What is the Great Red Spot

A
  • on Jupiter
  • huge typhoon-like storm that has lasted for at least 300 years
  • 25,000km long and 12,000 wide
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4
Q

Explain Differential rotation on Jupiter

A
  • near the poles, the rotation period of Jupiter’s atmosphere is five min longer than that at the equator
  • polar rotation time: 9h 55 min
  • Equatorial Rotation time: 9h and 50 min
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5
Q

What are the three main components of Jupiters atmosphere

A
  • ammonia
  • ammonium hydrosulfide
  • water
  • it is not expected for anything to survive penetration of Jupiter’s atmosphere
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6
Q

How are the belts and zones of Jupiter created?

A
  • combination of the planets convection and its rapid differential rotation
  • belts cool material sinking, zones warm material rising
  • wind patterns
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7
Q

What is Jupiters main sources of energy

A
  • internal heat built up during Jupiter’s formation is leaking out
  • gravitational energy
  • nuclear energy
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8
Q

Explain Jupiters interior

A
  • atmosphere gets denser and denser towards its interior
  • gaseous hydrogen
  • liquid hydrogen
  • liquid metallic hydrogen (generates large magnetic field)
  • rocky core (15 times earths mass)
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9
Q

What are the four Galilean Moons?

A

(still Jupiter)

  1. Io
  2. Europa
  3. Ganymede
  4. Calisto
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10
Q

Describe Io

A
  • closest moon to Jupiter
  • covered in active volcanoes
  • tidal forces from jupiter and other moons keep lo interior heated and liquid
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11
Q

Describe Europa

A
  • houses liquid water a few km under its icy surface

- scars on europa believed to be caused by rising warmed ice

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12
Q

Describe Ganymede

A
  • largest satellite in the solar system

- larger than mercury

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13
Q

What is Galileo Regio

A
  • Ganymedes largest feature is a huge dark circular region called Galileo Regio
  • shows deep “rocky frozen waves”
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14
Q

Describe Calisto

A
  • a huge asteroid impact still marks the surface of calisto

- faded rings on surface were the result of a huge impact

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15
Q

How many other Asteroid like moons does Jupiter have

A
  • at least 72 others
  • metis (closer than io to Jupiter)
  • adrastea (closer than io to Jupiter)
  • thebe
  • amalthea
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16
Q

What did voyager 1 find on jupiter

A
  • dilute ringlets
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17
Q

Explain Jupiters Magnetic field

A
  • two toroidal (bagel) shaped regions of trapped solar wind particles (similar to van allen belts)
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18
Q

What was the last planet known to ancient astronomers

A

Saturn

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19
Q

How is Jupiter and Saturn similar

A
  • they both have bands of belts and zones
  • there is much less contrast between the belts and zones on saturn
  • very little swirling structure in saturns clouds
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20
Q

What was Saturn named after

A
  • Cronus

- its roman

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21
Q

Explain the two storms merging on saturn

A
  • storms and hurricanes stronger in the southern hemisphere
  • there are two separate storms on saturn that eventually merge
  • there is a region in the south pole where clouds are lined up along a hexagon, strong lightening is usual in this region
  • storm of bigger suns
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22
Q

What is the main difference between the interiors of Jupiter and Saturn

A
  • saturn does not convert as much of it’s hydrogen into liquid
  • less mass
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23
Q

Who discovered Saturns rings? When?

A
  • Galileo (1610) saw the rings though they disappeared when he next went to observe them , did not publish his findings
  • 1655, Christian Huygens described them as a disk surrounding saturn
24
Q

Do the rings ever touch Saturn

A

no they are completely detached

25
Q

Why cant Saturns rings be flat solid objects

A
  • because they would be destroyed by the rotation tidal force
26
Q

Do all ringlets have their own orbit

A

yes and they have their own speed to

- ringlets closer to the planet move faster and the father ringlets move slower

27
Q

What are Saturns rings made out of

A
  • icy particles that form the “solid” portions of saturns rings (rocks covered with ice)
  • these clumps are continuously forming and dispersing
  • the rings themselves are about 10 meters to 1 km think
28
Q

Why can we see saturns rings with a telescope

A

because they are covered with pure ice they are highly reflective
- they reflect light like a mirror

29
Q

How come saturns rings “disappear” and why Galileo didnt see them

A
  • at some points in the orbit we see the full face of the rings and sometimes the rings disappear when we see them edge on
30
Q

What is the width of Saturns ring system

A

200,000 km

31
Q

What are the apparent gaps in saturns ring system

A
  • these gaps in the rings contain even more ringlets

- Cassini and encke division

32
Q

What is Saturns moon

A

Titan

33
Q

Who discovered Titan, What is special about its atmosphere?

A
  • one of saturns moons
  • discovered by Christian Huygens In 1665
  • its atmosphere is three times as thick as earths and composed on nitrogen and a variety of carbon-hydrogen compounds which are actually components of oil
  • only moon with thick and dense atmosphere
  • rocky
34
Q

What is the very ambition mission

A

the molecules in titans atmosphere appeared naturally without any intervention of biological activity
- this created speculation about potential origin of primitive forms of life on titan

35
Q

What is the Cassini/ Huygens mission

A
  • NASA and ESA collaborative mission to explore saturn and titan
36
Q

Why is Titan Interesting?

A
  • the presence of methane: UV sunlight could produce complex organic molecules
  • it was recognized that Titan’s atmosphere might chemically represent the early earth atmosphere
37
Q

Titans Atmosphere

A
  • contains volcanoes, organic sediments, rivers, lake, fog , condensate haze
38
Q

Explain Uranus’s Unusual seasons

A
  • Uranus axis of rotation is tilted so steeply that it lies nearly in the plane of its orbit,
  • Seasons on Uranus are unusual
  • very long summers and winters
39
Q

What are the three regions of Urnaus and Neptunes Interiors

A
  • terrestrial core surrounded by liquid water mantel, surrounded by liquid helium and hydrogen
  • thin and dilute atmospheres
40
Q

How were Unranus’ rings discovered

A
  • star occultation (passes infront of another)
  • there are three partial eclipse where time didnt disappear , the light of the star was just dimmed or blocked by the rings
41
Q

What is Triton

A
  • Neptunes Largest moon

- might hide a water ocean under this thick layer of ice

42
Q

What is the name of the first asteroid and who discovered it

A
  • called Ceres

- discovered by Giuzeppe Piazzi

43
Q

Where is the Asteroid belt

A
  • between mars and jupiters orbits

- the asteroids belt never crosses the earths orbit

44
Q

What is the Kuiper Belt

A
  • region of our solar system beyond our main planets
  • between neptunes and sun
  • far larger than the asteroid belt, 20 times as wide
45
Q

What is the closest Trans-neptunian object to earth

A
  • pluto
    made a TNO in 1931
  • pluto has 3 moons
    Charon, hydra and nix
46
Q

New Horizons Space Probe

A
  • took very high resolution pics of pluto and charon
47
Q

What is a comet

A
  • an icy small solar system body that when passing close to the sun, warms and begins to evolve gasses
  • processes called outgassing
48
Q

Where does the word comet come from

A
  • greek

- wearing long hair

49
Q

The structure of a comet

A
  • nucleus: solid core structure composed of rock, dust, water, ice, frozen gases
  • coma: water and dust, create a thin atmosphere around the comet by solar radiation and solar
    wind
  • gas tail: light single ions which gain high speeds
  • Dust tail: tiny particles which move significantly slower
50
Q

What caused the Wolfe Creek Crater

A

asteroid
300,000 years old
- 60 m deep

51
Q

What is the Manicouagan Crater

A
  • oldest known impact craters visible on earth
  • Quebec
  • contains a annular lake called Manicouagan Reservoir
  • result from 5 km diameter asteroid
52
Q

What is a meteoroid

A
  • small rocky or metallic body in outer space

- sig smaller than asteroid

53
Q

What is a meteor

A
  • shooting star
  • falling star
  • glowing meteoroid, comet or asteroid through the earths atmosphere
54
Q

What is a Meteorite

A
  • solid piece of debris from a meteoroid that survives its passage through the earths atmosphere and impact with the earths surface
55
Q

What is the Oort Cloud

A
  • hypothetical spherical cloud of comets which may lie 50,000 AU or 1 LY from the sun
  • billions of comets
56
Q

How many planets are confirmed outside or our solar system

A

more than 4000 confirmed exoplanets

Astronomy (10 decks)

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