The Solar System

The problem with this nice picture is that it seems to suggest:- - The spacing between the planets is roughly the same !! - Jupiter’s diameter is only three times bigger than Mars’s !!! - All the planets lie between the Earth/Moon and the Sun !!!! Our Solar System

Mercury Mercury photographed by ‘flypast’spacecraft. Why the ‘bald bit’ ? Craters suggest no weathering or erosion, which means no atmosphere, which means low gravity, which means a small planet

Mercury – the closest to the Sun 1) Photo- graphed from this direction 3) Photo- graphed from this direction 2) Photo-graphed from this direction This area not photo- graphed

Comparing the size of Mercury with the Earth

Venus – hottest planetary surface We can only ever see the tops of the thick bright clouds

Comparing the size of the Earth with Venus

Earth – ‘liquid water with life’ planet

The Moon, where astronauts visited Note:- moon = name for a small body in orbit around a planet Note:- Moon = the name for the moon which is in orbit around Earth Moon craters suggest no erosion  no atmosphere  low gravity  small mass

Comparing the size of the Moon with the Earth

Mars – the red dusty planet

Phobos Deimos The fact that they are irregularly shaped is because they are small (If they were big, the gravitational force associated with their mass would have forced them into an approximately spherical shape). Mars’s two Moons

Jupiter – the biggest of the planets

Like the Earth, Jupiter has a magnetosphere

Earth could easily fit into Jupiter’s Red Spot Comparing the size of Earth with Jupiter

Saturn and the amazing Rings Photographed by Voyager 2 during its 1981 flypast

Close-up of the Ring System

Comparing the size of Saturn with the Earth and the Moon

Uranus – the ‘bland surface’ planet

Comparing the size of Uranus with the Earth

Uranus’s moons

Neptune – the blue windy(!!) planet

Comparing the size of the Earth with Neptune

Pluto – the dwarf planet The best earth-based image of Pluto and its moon Charon

A Composite image of Pluto taken by Hubble Space Telescope

Comparing the size of Pluto with the Earth