The Solar System and it's Formation

The Solar System and it's Formation

Chapter 25

Multiple Select

The solar system contains many objects that orbit our sun. Check off the objects that are in our solar system.

• Sun

• Planets and Dwarf Planets

• Other Stars

• Moons

• Asteroids, Comets, Meteoroids

Multiple Select

Which of these shows a Model of the Heliocentric Solar System?

• Image on the Left

• Image on the Right

Multiple Choice

Ptolomy proposed the Geocentric (Earth Centered Model) to explain what we saw in the sky, who first created the Heliocentric Model?

• Aristotle

• Copernicus

• Galileo

Multiple Choice

Which person used the telescope and his observations about the phases of Venus to argue that the Heliocentric Model was correct?

• Aristotle

• Copernicus

• Galileo

• Ptolomy

Multiple Choice

Which of these has the planets in the correct order from the sun outward?

• Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars

• Mars, Venus, Earth, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus

• Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune

Multiple Select

Check off all the planets that are classified as Gas Giants as they are huge and composed of mostly Hydrogen and Helium.

• Mercury

• Jupiter

• Saturn

• Neptune

• Uranus

Keplers Three Laws of Orbital Motion

Multiple Choice

Kepler described the orbital motion of the planets as being perfect circles.

• True

• False

Multiple Choice

According to Kepler's Second Law, during which section of this planets orbit would it be travelling the fastest?

• From Section A-B

• From Section X-Y

Multiple Choice

Large rocks that mostly orbit in a "belt" between Mars and Jupiter.

• Meteors

• Asteroids

• Dwarf Planets

• Comets

Dwarf Planets

• Pluto is not alone!

• These are just the ones that have been observed.

Characteristics of a Orbits of the Dwarf Planets

• 
  

• 
  

Multiple Select

Which characteristics of a planet does Pluto have? (check all that are true)

• is it a celestial body in the Solar Systemthat orbits the sun?

• is it massive enough for its own gravity to make it round?

• Has it cleared its orbit of smaller objects?

The Formation of our Solar System

25.5

Multiple Choice

What is one hypothesis that could explain the force that may have started the collapse of our solar nebula?

• the big bang theory

• the shockwave from the explosion of a nearby star

• gravity alone

Solar Nebula

• A large thin cloud of gas and dust (range form light years to millions of light years across)

• nebulae are made of dust and gases (mostly hydrogen and helium) which are remnants of old stars.

About 5 billion years ago..

• The solar nebula starts to contract due to the gravitational forces

• As it contracted it started to spin

• As the nebula shrank the spinning forces increased flattening it into a disk

The Sun Forms (c)

• after about 10 million years the density of this protostar will reach over 1,000,000 degrees

• This is enough heat and pressure to cause nuclear fusion to begin and it becomes a real star!

The Gas Giants

•  The solar wind swept away lighter elements, such as hydrogen and helium, from the closer regions, leaving only heavy, rocky materials to create smaller terrestrial worlds.

• But farther away, the solar winds had less impact on lighter elements, allowing them to coalesce into gas giants.

• In this way, asteroids, comets, planets, and moons were created.

Planetesimals

• The planetesimals (c) continue colliding and growing

• Once they become about 1 km in diameter they have significant gravitational attraction on nearby objects

• now they start to become moonsized (d)

The Solar System

Once gravity/accretion pull most of the material together the area between the planets gets clearer and we now have the Solar System we see today.

Hubble Evidence of the Nebular Theory

Exosolar system!

The star TYC 8998-760-1 (top center) was photographed with two giant exoplanets (arrows), the first time astronomers have directly imaged more than one planet orbiting a sunlike star. The bright spots above star TYC 8998-760-1 are other stars in the background.