THE SOLAR SYSTEM
Our solar system consists of our star, the Sun, and everything bound to it by gravity — the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, dwarf planets such as Pluto, dozens of moons, and millions of asteroids, comets and meteoroids. Beyond our own solar system, we have discovered thousands of planetary systems orbiting other stars in the Milky Way.
Now known
The solar system has 169 moons
One star, eight planets (added Uranus and Neptune), eight asteroids
More than 100 Kuiper belt objects more than 300 km in diameter, and many smaller asteroids, comets, and meteoroid
More than 800 extrasolar planets have been found Understanding planetary formation in our own solar system helps understand its formation as well as the formation of other system
The Overall Layout of the Solar System
The movement of the planets was heliocentrism, which means the sun is in the center and the planets orbit around it. Here we will discuss the arrangement of the planets and some information about each planet
Sun
The Sun is the largest object within our solar system, comprising 99.8% of the system’s mass.
The Sun is located at the center of our solar system, and Earth orbits 93 million miles away from it.
Though massive, the Sun still isn’t as large as other types of stars. It’s classified as a yellow dwarf star.
The Sun's magnetic field spreads throughout the solar system via the solar wind.
Moon
Moon has large dark flat areas, due to lava flow, called maria
(early observers thought they were oceans)Moon is tidally locked to Earth—its rotation rate is the same as the time it takes to make one revolution, so the same side of the Moon always faces Earth
Mercury
is the closest to the sun
Mercury is much denser than the Moon and has a weak magnetic field. The field is due to a molten core, similar to the Earth’s, but details are not understood as Mercury rotates very slowly
Venus
•Venus is much brighter than Mercury and can be farther from the Sun
• Called morning or evening star, as it is still “tied” to Sun
• Brightest object in the sky, after Sun and Moon
Earth
Our home planet is the third planet from the Sun, and the only place we know of so far that’s inhabited by living things. While Earth is only the fifth largest planet in the solar system, it is the only world in our solar system with liquid water on the surface. Just slightly larger than nearby Venus, Earth is the biggest of the four planets closest to the Sun, all of which are made of rock and metal.
Mars
The fourth planet from the Sun, Mars is a dusty, cold, desert world with a very thin atmosphere.
This dynamic planet has seasons, polar ice caps, canyons, extinct volcanoes, and evidence that it was even more active in the past.
Mars is one of the most explored bodies in our solar system, and it's the only planet where NASA sent rovers to roam the alien landscape
Jupiter
Fifth in line from the Sun, Jupiter is, by far, the largest planet in the solar system – more than twice as massive as all the other planets combined.
Jupiter's familiar stripes and swirls are actually cold, windy clouds of ammonia and water, floating in an atmosphere of hydrogen and helium. Jupiter’s iconic Great Red Spot is a giant storm bigger than Earth that has raged for hundreds of years.
Saturn
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest planet in our solar system.
Adorned with thousands of beautiful ringlets, Saturn is unique among the planets. It is not the only planet to have rings—made of chunks of ice and rock—but none are as spectacular or as complicated as Saturn's.
Is a massive ball made mostly of hydrogen and helium.
Uranus
Uranus is known as the “sideways planet” because it rotates on its side.
Uranus is an Ice Giant planet and nearly four times larger than Earth.
Uranus has 27 known moons, most of which are named after literary characters.
Like Saturn, Jupiter, and Neptune, Uranus is a ringed planet.
Neptune
Dark, cold, and whipped by supersonic winds, ice giant Neptune is the eighth and most distant planet in our solar system.
More than 30 times as far from the Sun as Earth, Neptune is the only planet in our solar system not visible to the naked eye and the first predicted by mathematics before its discovery. In 2011 Neptune completed its first 165-year orbit since its discovery in 1846.