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Our Solar System
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Have you ever looked up into the sky and wondered
what was there? Higher than the birds, past
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the clouds, and farther than the moon, a whole
host of fascinating objects spin in outer space.
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Let's imagine for a moment that we can leave
the earth behind, and explore the solar system
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that surrounds it.
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We call it the solar system because everything
in it is centered around the sun, and solar
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means something to do with the sun. The sun
is a star, just like many of the stars that
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you can see in the night sky - just many times
closer to us. Still, the sun is very, very
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far away from the earth; almost 93 million
miles away: that's why it looks so small,
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even though it's the biggest object in the
solar system.
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In fact, the sun makes up more than
99% of the mass in the solar system.
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If you put all of the planets,
moons, asteroids,
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comets, and everything else in the solar system
together, they would make up less than one
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quarter of a percent of it.
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The sun is so big that it's more than 100
times wider than the earth, and if it were
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a giant jar you could fit more
than one million earths into it.
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More than that, the sun is what holds the
solar system together. Its massive gravity
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is what keeps the earth and all the other
planets circling around it instead of drifting
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off into space.
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The sun is also what allows us to live on
Earth. Without the sun, there would be no
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heat. There would be no light. Plants could
not grow, water would freeze, and nothing
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could survive. The sun gives us heat and light
because it is always burning: it is a giant
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ball of gas, mostly hydrogen and helium, and
it burns at millions of degrees in its center.
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Let's leave the sun now to explore the planets.
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As we move away from the sun, the first planet
we will encounter is Mercury. Mercury is the
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smallest planet in the solar system, much
smaller than earth, and one of only five planets
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you can see from earth using nothing but your
eyes. Of course, it won't look much like a
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planet. It looks more like a bright star,
and many nights you can see it close to the
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horizon near sunrise and sunset.
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Mercury is a lot like our moon. It's small
and has a rocky surface with craters on it.
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It has no moon of its own, and no air to breathe.
You probably wouldn't enjoy a visit to mercury,
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since temperatures are boiling hot in the
sun and freezing cold in the shade. Something
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interesting about mercury is that it is the
fastest planet to go around the sun - it only
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takes 88 days.
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Next is Venus, the second planet. Some people
call venus earth's sister, because the two
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planets are very close in size and gravity,
but they are very different on the surface.
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First of all, it is very hot. Venus is the
hottest planet in the solar system. It's not
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as close to the sun as mercury, but its thick
atmosphere of carbon dioxide helps it to trap
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the heat and stay warmer than its neighbor.
It has a thick atmosphere, but it is not one
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you could breathe. It is mostly made of carbon
dioxide and there are clouds of sulfuric acid!
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Venus might not be fun to visit, but it is
beautiful to lok at. It is the second-brightest
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object in the night sky - the only thing brighter
is the moon. If you are looking at a sunrise
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or a sunset and suddenly notice what looks
like a very bright star, you are probably
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looking at Venus.
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After Venus comes Earth, the third planet
from the sun. Of course, you know all about
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Earth, because that's the planet where we
live! Earth is what's called a 'goldilocks
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planet,' because it's not too hot, and not
too cold - it's just right. As far as we know,
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Earth is the only planet to have living things.
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Let's leave earth again for a moment, though,
and visit Mars, the fourth planet from the
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sun. Mars is known as the 'red planet,' because
iron oxide (a material like rust) in the soil
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gives it a reddish color. Mars is smaller
than Venus and the earth, but larger than
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mercury. It is cold and rocky, with a thin
atmosphere made of carbon dioxide and oxygen.
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There is water ice on mars.
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Scientists are very interested in mars because
they think that people could live there with
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the help of some special equipment. Rockets
and probes have already been sent there to
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gain more information about the planet. Right
now, there are two special robots exploring
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the surface of mars, sending information back
to earth.
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Mars is the first planet we've visited today
besides Earth to have its own moons. It has
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two, although they are not big and round like
our moon. Mars's moons are small and irregular.
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Scientists think they may be captured asteroids.
Maybe they came from the big asteroid belt
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that is between mars and jupiter. An asteroid
belt is a big ring of asteroids, or rocky
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objects, orbiting the sun.
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Jupiter comes next, the fifth planet in the
solar system. Jupiter is the largest planet
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and is something called a 'gas giant.' It
is called this because it is really big and
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made mostly of gasses. Jupiter is so big that
you would have to place 11 earths end to end
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just to stretch across its middle.
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Jupiter is also the third brightest object
in the night sky; only venus and the moon
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are brighter. You can usually find Jupiter
higher in the sky than venus, since Jupiter
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is away from the sun and not towards it.
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Jupiter has at least 67 moons that circle
around it, but 55 of them are very small,
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only about as big as a mountain, or smaller.
Some of its moons are very large, and at least
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two of them are about the same size as the
planet Mercury. One of its moons
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is the largest moon in the solar system. Some
of these large moons can be seen from earth
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in your backyard with a telescope.
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People cannot land on Jupiter because it is
made of gas - there is no ground to land on!
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Even if there was somewhere to land, Jupiter
is covered by terrible storms, much stronger
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than even the strongest storms on earth. One
storm that we know about can be seen from
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earth. We call it the great red spot because
that's what it looks like - and it has been
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going on for at least 200 years!
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After Jupiter comes Saturn, another gas giant.
Saturn is famous for its beautiful rings.
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Although they look solid from a distance,
the rings are actually made from many, many
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small ice particle, as well as rocks and dust.
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Saturn also has more than sixty moons orbiting
around it, some as large as the planet mercury,
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and many smaller.
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Something interesting about Saturn is that
even though it is very large, it is not very
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dense. That means that if you could find a
bathtub large enough to put saturn in, it
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would float instead of sink!
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Saturn is the farthest planet that can be
seen from earth without the help of a telescope.
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After saturn comes uranus, the seventh planet
from the sun. Uranus is another gas giant,
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but it is much smaller than Saturn and Jupiter.
Unlike any other planet in the solar system,
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it is tilted so much that it actually spins
sideways! Uranus has rings around it, although
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they are much smaller than saturn's, and 27
known moons. Uranus is covered in blue clouds
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made of methane, which give it its lovely
color.
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Very similar to uranus is Neptune, the eighth
planet from the sun. Neptune is another gas
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giant, and like uranus it has methane in its
atmosphere so it also looks blue. Neptune
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is a darker blue than uranus and scientists
aren't sure why. Neptune has a few thin rings
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and 14 moons that we know about.
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Because neptune is so far out in space, it
takes it a very, very long time to go around
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the sun. Remember Mercury, that only takes
88 days to go once around the sun? Poor neptune
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takes over 164 YEARS to finish an orbit around
the sun. The last time that neptune was in
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the same place it is now was before the American
Civil War, before computers, phones, airplanes,
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or cars had been invented! Neptune has the
longest orbit of any planet in the solar system.
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Now, you may think that I've forgotten someone
- Pluto. Pluto was discovered in 1930 and
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was listed as the ninth planet in the solar
system. As it was studied longer, scientists
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realized how small it is. It is much smaller
than any other planet in the solar system,
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and even smaller than many other moons. Plus,
people started to discover other small, rocky
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planet-like objects in space near pluto. Some
of them were even bigger than pluto! In 2006,
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after 76 years being listed as a planet, Pluto
was declared a 'dwarf planet' to show that
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it was something that was like a planet, but
much smaller. There are at least 6 dwarf planets
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in the solar system, and possibly many, many
more.
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That leaves us with 8 official planets in
our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars,
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Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.
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I hope you enjoyed exploring the solar system
with me today. Goodbye till next time!
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