Planets of the solar system and their names. What is the solar system? Almost everything on planet Earth is a rare element

It's hard to believe, but once the Cosmos was completely empty. There were no planets, no satellites, no stars. Where did they come from? How was the solar system formed? These questions have troubled mankind for centuries. This article will help to give some idea of ​​what the Cosmos is and will reveal interesting facts about the planets of the solar system.

How it all began

The Universe is the entire visible and invisible Cosmos, together with all existing cosmic bodies. Several theories have been put forward:

3. Divine intervention. Our Universe is so unique, everything in it is thought out to the smallest detail, that it could not arise by itself. Only the Great Creator is capable of creating such a miracle. Absolutely not a scientific theory, but it has the right to exist.

Disputes about the causes of the true origin of outer space continue. In fact, we have an idea of ​​the solar system, which includes a burning star and eight planets with their satellites, galaxies, stars, comets, black holes and much more.

Amazing discoveries or interesting facts about the planets of the solar system

Outer spaces beckon with their mystery. Each celestial body keeps its own mystery. Thanks to astronomical discoveries, valuable information about heavenly wanderers appears.

Closest to the sun is Mercury. There is an opinion that it was once a satellite of Venus. But as a result of a cosmic catastrophe, the cosmic body separated from Venus and acquired its own orbit. A year on Mercury is 88 days, and a day is 59 days.

Mercury is the only planet in the solar system where you can observe the movement of the Sun in the opposite direction. This phenomenon has a completely logical explanation. The speed of rotation of the planet around its axis is much slower than the movement in its orbit. Due to such a difference in speed regimes, the effect of changing the movement of the Sun arises.

On Mercury you can observe a fantastic phenomenon: two sunsets and sunrises. And if you move to the meridians 0˚ and 180̊, then you can witness three sunsets and sunrises per day.

Venus goes next to Mercury. Lights up in the sky during sunset on Earth, but you can observe it for only a couple of hours. Because of this feature, she was nicknamed "Evening Star". Interestingly, the orbit of Venus lies inside the orbit of our planet. But it moves in the opposite direction, counterclockwise. A year on the planet lasts 225 days, and 1 day is 243 Earth days. Venus, like the Moon, has a phase change, transforming either into a thin sickle or into a wide circle. There is an assumption that some types of terrestrial bacteria can live in the atmosphere of Venus.

Earth- truly a pearl of the solar system. Only on it there is a huge variety of life forms. People feel so comfortable on this planet and do not even realize that it is rushing along its orbit at a speed of 108,000 km per hour.

The fourth planet from the Sun is Mars. He is accompanied by two companions. A day on this planet is equivalent in duration to the earth - 24 hours. But 1 year lasts 668 days. Just like on Earth, the seasons change here. Seasons cause changes in the appearance of the planet.

Jupiter- the largest space giant. It has many satellites (more than 60 pieces) and 5 rings. It is 318 times the mass of Earth. But, despite its impressive size, it moves quite quickly. It turns around its own axis in just 10 hours, but it overcomes the distance around the Sun in 12 years.

The weather on Jupiter is bad - constant storms and hurricanes, accompanied by lightning. A striking representative of such weather conditions is the Great Red Spot - a whirlwind moving at a speed of 435 km / h.

hallmark Saturn, certainly are his rings. These flat formations are made up of dust and ice. The thickness of the circles ranges from 10 - 15 m to 1 km, the width from 3,000 km to 300,000 km. The rings of the planet are not a single whole, but represent formations in the form of thin spokes. Also, the planet is surrounded by more than 62 satellites.

Saturn has an incredibly high rate of rotation, so much so that it is compressed at the poles. A day on the planet lasts 10 hours, a year - 30 years.

Uranus, like Venus, it moves around the star counterclockwise. The uniqueness of the planet lies in the fact that it "lies on its side", its axis is tilted at an angle of 98˚. There is a theory that the planet took this position after a collision with another space object.

Like Saturn, Uranus has a complex ring system, consisting of a combination of an inner and outer group of rings. In total, Uranus has 13 of them. It is believed that the rings are the remains of the former satellite of Uranus, which collided with the planet.

Uranus does not have a solid surface, a third of the radius, approximately 8,000 km, is a gaseous shell.

Neptune is the last planet in the solar system. It is surrounded by 6 dark rings. The most beautiful shade of the sea wave to the planet is given by methane, which is present in the atmosphere. Neptune makes one revolution in its orbit in 164 years. But around its axis it moves quite quickly, and the day passes for
16 hours. In some places, the orbit of Neptune intersects with the orbit of Pluto.

Neptune has a large number of moons. Basically, they all rotate in front of the orbit of Neptune and are called internal. There are only two outer satellites accompanying the planet.

You can see it on Neptune. However, outbreaks are too weak and occur throughout the planet, and not exclusively at the poles, as on Earth.

Once in space, there were 9 planets. This number also included Pluto. But due to its small size, the astronomical community has identified it as a series of dwarf planets (asteroids).

These are interesting facts and amazing stories about the planets of the solar system that are revealed in the process of exploring the black depths of the Cosmos.

> solar system

solar system- planets in order, Sun, structure, system model, satellites, space missions, asteroids, comets, dwarf planets, interesting facts.

solar system- a place in outer space in which the Sun, planets in order and many other space objects and celestial bodies are located. The solar system is the most precious place we live in, our home.

Our Universe is a huge place where we occupy a tiny corner. But for earthlings, the solar system seems to be the most immense territory, to the far corners of which we are only beginning to approach. And she still hides a lot of mysterious and mysterious formations. So, despite centuries of study, we have only slightly opened the door to the unknown. So what is the solar system? Today we will consider this issue.

Discovery of the solar system

The actual need to look into the sky and you will see our system. But few peoples and cultures understood exactly where we exist and what place we occupy in space. For a long time, we thought that our planet is static, located in the center, and the rest of the objects rotate around it.

But still, even in ancient times, supporters of heliocentrism appeared, whose ideas would inspire Nicolaus Copernicus to create a true model, where the Sun was located in the center.

In the 17th century, Galileo, Kepler and Newton were able to prove that the planet Earth revolves around the star Sun. The discovery of gravity helped to understand that other planets follow the same laws of physics.

The revolutionary moment came with the advent of the first telescope from Galileo Galilei. In 1610, he noticed Jupiter and its satellites. This will be followed by the discovery of other planets.

In the 19th century, three important observations were made that helped to calculate the true nature of the system and its position in space. In 1839, Friedrich Bessel successfully identified an apparent shift in stellar position. This showed that there is a huge distance between the Sun and the stars.

In 1859, G. Kirchhoff and R. Bunsen used a telescope to conduct a spectral analysis of the Sun. It turned out that it consists of the same elements as the Earth. The parallax effect is visible in the lower figure.

As a result, Angelo Secchi was able to compare the spectral signature of the Sun with the spectra of other stars. It turned out that they almost converge. Percival Lowell carefully studied the distant corners and orbital paths of the planets. He guessed that there was still an undiscovered object - Planet X. In 1930, Clyde Tombaugh noticed Pluto in his observatory.

In 1992, scientists expand the boundaries of the system by discovering a trans-Neptunian object - 1992 QB1. From this moment begins the interest in the Kuiper belt. The following are the finds of Eris and other objects from the team of Michael Brown. All of this will lead to an IAU meeting and the removal of Pluto from planetary status. Below you can study in detail the composition of the solar system, considering all the solar planets in order, the main star the Sun, the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, the Kuiper belt and the Oort Cloud. The solar system also hides the largest planet (Jupiter) and the smallest (Mercury).

Structure and composition of the solar system

Comets are lumps of snow and mud filled with frozen gas, rocks, and dust. The closer they get to the Sun, the more they heat up and throw out dust and gas, increasing their brightness.

Dwarf planets rotate around the star, but could not remove foreign objects from orbit. They are inferior in size to standard planets. The most famous representative is Pluto.

The Kuiper Belt lurks outside of Neptune's orbit, filled with icy bodies and formed into a disk. The most famous representatives are Pluto and Eris. Hundreds of ice dwarfs live on its territory. Farthest away is the Oort Cloud. Together they act as a source of incoming comets.

The solar system is only a small part of the Milky Way. Beyond its borders is a large-scale space filled with stars. At light speed, it would take 100,000 years to fly over the entire area. Our galaxy is one of many in the universe.

At the center of the system is the main and only star - the Sun (main sequence G2). The first are 4 terrestrial planets (inner), the asteroid belt, 4 gas giants, the Kuiper belt (30-50 AU) and the spherical Oort Cloud, extending to 100,000 AU. to the interstellar medium.

The sun holds 99.86% of the total systemic mass, and gravity outweighs all forces. Most of the planets are located near the ecliptic and rotate in the same direction (counterclockwise).

Approximately 99% of the planetary mass is represented by gas giants, where Jupiter and Saturn cover more than 90%.

Informally, the system is divided into several sections. The inner one includes 4 terrestrial planets and an asteroid belt. Next comes the outer system with 4 giants. Separately, a zone with trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) is distinguished. That is, you can easily find the outer line, as it is marked by the large planets of the solar system.

Many planets are considered mini-systems, as they have a group of satellites. Gas giants also have rings - small bands of small particles rotating around the planet. Usually large moons arrive in a gravitational block. On the lower layout, you can see a comparison of the sizes of the Sun and the planets of the system.

The sun is 98% hydrogen and helium. Earth-type planets are endowed with silicate rock, nickel and iron. Giants are composed of gases and ices (water, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide).

The bodies of the solar system distant from the star have low temperature indicators. Ice giants (Neptune and Uranus), as well as small objects beyond their orbits, are isolated from here. Their gases and ices are volatile substances capable of condensing at a distance of 5 AU. from the sun.

The origin and evolutionary process of the solar system

Our system appeared 4.568 billion years ago as a result of the gravitational collapse of a large-scale molecular cloud, represented by hydrogen, helium and a small amount of heavier elements. This mass collapsed, which led to a rapid rotation.

Most of the mass gathered in the center. The temperature mark rose. The nebula contracted, increasing acceleration. This led to flattening into a protoplanetary disk with a red-hot protostar.

Due to the high level of boiling near the star, only metals and silicates can exist in solid form. As a result, 4 terrestrial planets appeared: Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. Metals were scarce, so they were unable to increase their size.

But the giants appeared farther away, where the material was cool and allowed the volatile ice compounds to remain in a solid state. There was much more ice, so the planets dramatically increased their scale, attracting huge amounts of hydrogen and helium into the atmosphere. The remnants failed to become planets and settled in the Kuiper Belt or moved to the Oort Cloud.

For 50 million years of development, the pressure and density of hydrogen in the protostar triggered nuclear fusion. Thus the Sun was born. The wind created the heliosphere and scattered gas and dust into space.

The system is still in its original state. But the Sun develops and after 5 billion years completely transforms hydrogen into helium. The core will collapse, releasing a huge energy reserve. The star will increase 260 times and become a red giant.

This will lead to the death of Mercury and Venus. Our planet will lose life because it will heat up. As a result, the outer stellar layers will break out into space, leaving behind a white dwarf, the size of our planet. A planetary nebula will form.

inner solar system

This is the line with the first 4 planets from the star. All of them have similar parameters. This is a rocky type, represented by silicates and metals. Located closer than the giants. They are inferior in density and size, and are also deprived of huge lunar families and rings.

Silicates form the crust and mantle, while metals are part of the cores. All, except Mercury, have an atmospheric layer that allows you to shape weather conditions. Impact craters and tectonic activity are visible on the surface.

Closest to the star is Mercury. It is also the smallest planet. The magnetic field reaches only 1% of that of the Earth, and the thin atmosphere leads to the fact that the planet is half hot (430°C) and freezes (-187°C).

Venus converges in size with the Earth and has a dense atmospheric layer. But the atmosphere is extremely toxic and works as a greenhouse. 96% consists of carbon dioxide, along with nitrogen and other impurities. Dense clouds are made from sulfuric acid. There are many canyons on the surface, the deepest of which reaches 6400 km.

Earth best studied because it is our home. It has a rocky surface covered with mountains and depressions. In the center is a heavy metal core. Water vapor is present in the atmosphere, which smoothes the temperature regime. The moon revolves nearby.

Because of the appearance Mars was nicknamed the Red Planet. The color is created by the oxidation of iron materials on the top layer. It is endowed with the largest mountain in the system (Olympus), rising to 21229 m, as well as the deepest canyon - the Mariner Valley (4000 km). Much of the surface is ancient. There are ice caps at the poles. A thin atmospheric layer hints at water deposits. The core is solid, and next to the planet there are two satellites: Phobos and Deimos.

outer solar system

Gas giants are located here - large-scale planets with lunar families and rings. Despite their size, only Jupiter and Saturn can be seen without the use of telescopes.

The largest planet in the solar system is Jupiter with a rapid rotational speed (10 hours) and an orbital path of 12 years. The dense atmospheric layer is filled with hydrogen and helium. The core can reach the size of the Earth. There are many satellites, faint rings, and the Great Red Spot, a powerful storm that has been unsettled for the 4th century.

Saturn- a planet that is recognized by its chic ring system (7 pieces). There are satellites in the system, and the hydrogen and helium atmosphere rotates rapidly (10.7 hours). It takes 29 years to go around the star.

In 1781 William Herschel found Uranus. A day on the giant lasts 17 hours, and it takes 84 years to orbit. It holds a huge amount of water, methane, ammonia, helium and hydrogen. All this is concentrated around the stone core. There is a lunar family and rings. Voyager 2 flew to it in 1986.

Neptune- a distant planet with water, methane, ammonium, hydrogen and helium. There are 6 rings and dozens of satellites. Voyager 2 also flew by in 1989.

Trans-Neptunian region of the solar system

Thousands of objects have already been found in the Kuiper belt, but it is believed that up to 100,000 with a diameter of more than 100 km live there. They are extremely small and located at large distances, so it is difficult to calculate the composition.

Spectrographs show an ice mixture: hydrocarbons, water ice and ammonia. Initial analysis showed a wide range of colors from neutral to bright red. This hints at the richness of the composition. A comparison of Pluto and KBO 1993 SC showed that they are extremely different in surface elements.

Water ice was found in 1996 TO66, 38628 Huya and 20000 Varuna, and crystalline ice was seen in Quaoar.

The Oort Cloud and Beyond the Solar System

This cloud is believed to extend from 2000-5000 AU. and up to 50,000 a.u. from a star. The outer edge can stretch up to 100,000-200,000 AU. The cloud is divided into two parts: outer spherical (20000-50000 AU) and inner (2000-20000 AU).

The outer one is inhabited by trillions of bodies with a diameter of a kilometer or more, as well as billions with a width of 20 km. There is no exact information about the mass, but it is believed that Halley's comet is a typical representative. The total mass of the cloud is 3 x 10 25 km (5 lands).

If we focus on comets, then most of the cloud bodies are represented by ethane, water, carbon monoxide, methane, ammonia and hydrogen cyanide. The population of 1-2% consists of asteroids.

Bodies from the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud are called Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNOs) because they are further away from Neptune's orbital path.

Exploring the solar system

The size of the solar system still seems immense, but our knowledge has expanded significantly with the sending of probes into outer space. The boom in the study of outer space began in the middle of the 20th century. Now it can be noted that all solar planets have been approached at least once by terrestrial vehicles. We have photos, videos, as well as analysis of the soil and atmosphere (for some).

The first artificial spacecraft was the Soviet Sputnik-1. He was sent into space in 1957. Spent several months in orbit collecting atmospheric and ionospheric data. In 1959, the United States joined with Explorer 6, which first took pictures of our planet.

These devices provided a huge array of information about planetary features. Luna-1 was the first to go to another object. He raced past our satellite in 1959. Mariner became a successful mission to Venus in 1964, Mariner 4 arrived at Mars in 1965, and the 10th flight in 1974 passed Mercury.

Since the 1970s the attack on the outer planets begins. Pioneer 10 flew past Jupiter in 1973, and the next mission visited Saturn in 1979. The real breakthrough was the Voyagers, which circled the large giants and their satellites in the 1980s.

The Kuiper Belt is being handled by New Horizons. In 2015, the device successfully reached Pluto, sending the first close pictures and a lot of information. Now he rushes to the distant TNO.

But we yearned to land on another planet, so rovers and probes began to be sent in the 1960s. Luna 10 was the first to enter lunar orbit in 1966. In 1971, Mariner 9 settled near Mars, and Verena 9 orbited the second planet in 1975.

Galileo first swirled near Jupiter in 1995, and the famous Cassini appeared near Saturn in 2004. MESSENGER and Dawn visited Mercury and Vesta in 2011. And the latter still managed to fly around the dwarf planet Ceres in 2015.

The first spacecraft to land on the surface was Luna 2 in 1959. This was followed by landings on Venus (1966), Mars (1971), asteroid 433 Eros (2001), Titan and Tempel in 2005.

Now controlled vehicles have visited only Mars and the Moon. But the first robotic was Lunokhod 1 in 1970. Spirit (2004), Opportunity (2004) and Curiosity (2012) landed on Mars.

The 20th century was marked by the space race between America and the USSR. For the Soviets, this was the East program. The first mission came in 1961, when Yuri Gagarin was in orbit. In 1963, the first woman flew - Valentina Tereshkova.

In the United States, the Mercury project was developed, where they also planned to take people into space. The first American to go into orbit was Alan Shepard in 1961. After the end of both programs, countries focused on long-term and short-term flights.

The main goal was to land a man on the moon. The USSR was developing a capsule for 2-3 people, and the Gemini were trying to create a device for a safe lunar landing. In 1969, Apollo 11 ended up successfully landing Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the satellite. In 1972, they completed 5 more landings, and all were Americans.

The next challenge was the creation of a space station and reusable vehicles. The Soviets formed the Salyut and Almaz stations. The first station with a large number of crews was NASA Skylab. The first settlement was the Soviet Mir, functioning in 1989-1999. It was replaced by the International Space Station in 2001.

The only reusable spacecraft was Columbia, which completed several orbital passes. 5 shuttles completed 121 missions, and retired in 2011. Due to accidents, two shuttles crashed: Challenger (1986) and Columbia (2003).

In 2004, George W. Bush announced his intention to return to the moon and conquer the Red Planet. This idea was supported by Barack Obama. As a result, now all the forces are spent on the exploration of Mars and plans to create a human colony.

All these flights and sacrifices have led to a better understanding of our system, its past and future. In the current model, there are 8 planets, 4 dwarfs and a huge number of TNOs. Let's not forget about the army of asteroids and planetosimals.

On the page you can find out not only useful information about the solar system, its structure and size, but also get detailed description and a description of all the planets in order with names, photos, videos, diagrams and an indication of the distance from the Sun. The composition and structure of the solar system will no longer be a mystery. Also use our 3D model to explore all the celestial bodies on your own.

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The boundless space, despite the apparent chaos, is a fairly harmonious structure. In this gigantic world, the immutable laws of physics and mathematics also apply. All objects in the Universe, from small to large, occupy their specific place, move along given orbits and trajectories. This order was established more than 15 billion years ago, since the formation of the Universe. Our solar system is no exception - the cosmic metropolis in which we live.

Despite its colossal size, the solar system fits within the human framework of perception, being the most studied part of the cosmos, with well-defined boundaries.

Origin and main astrophysical parameters

In a universe where there are an infinite number of stars, other solar systems certainly exist. In our galaxy alone, the Milky Way, there are approximately 250-400 billion stars, so it cannot be ruled out that worlds with other life forms may exist in the depths of space.

As early as 150-200 years ago, man had meager ideas about space. The dimensions of the Universe were limited by the lenses of telescopes. The sun, moon, planets, comets and asteroids were the only known objects, and the entire cosmos was measured by the size of our galaxy. The situation changed dramatically at the beginning of the 20th century. Astrophysical exploration of outer space and the work of nuclear physicists over the past 100 years have given scientists an idea of ​​how the universe began. Became known and understood the processes that led to the formation of stars, gave building material for the formation of planets. In this light, the origin of the solar system becomes understandable and explainable.

The sun, like other stars, is a product of the Big Bang, after which stars were formed in space. There were objects large and small. In one of the corners of the Universe, among a cluster of other stars, our Sun was born. By cosmic standards, the age of our star is small, only 5 billion years. At the place of her birth, a giant construction site was formed, where, as a result of the gravitational compression of the gas and dust cloud, other objects of the solar system were formed.

Each celestial body took on its own form, took its place. Some celestial bodies, under the influence of the attraction of the Sun, became constant satellites, moving in their own orbit. Other objects ceased to exist as a result of counteraction of centrifugal and centripetal processes. This whole process took about 4.5 billion years. The mass of the entire solar economy is 1.0014 M☉. Of this mass, 99.8% falls on the Sun itself. Only 0.2% of the mass is accounted for by other space objects: planets, satellites and asteroids, fragments of space dust revolving around it.

The orbit of the solar system has an almost circular shape, and the orbital speed coincides with the speed of the galactic spiral. Passing through the interstellar medium, the stability of the solar system is given by the gravitational forces acting within our galaxy. This in turn provides other objects and bodies of the solar system with stability. The movement of the solar system takes place at a considerable distance from the superdense star clusters of our galaxy, which carry a potential danger.

By its size and number of satellites, our solar system cannot be called small. In space, there are small solar systems that have one or two planets and are barely visible in outer space in terms of their size. Representing a massive galactic object, the stellar system of the Sun moves in space at a tremendous speed of 240 km / s. Even despite such a rapid run, the solar system makes a complete revolution around the center of the galaxy in 225-250 million years.

The exact intergalactic address of our star system is as follows:

• local interstellar cloud;
• a local bubble in the Orion Cygnus arm;
• The Milky Way galaxy is part of the Local Group of Galaxies.

The sun is the central object of our system and is one of the 100 billion stars that make up the Milky Way galaxy. By its size, it is a medium-sized star and belongs to the spectral class G2V Yellow dwarfs. The diameter of the star is 1 million. 392 thousand kilometers, and she is in the middle of her life cycle.

For comparison, the size of Sirius, the brightest star, is 2 million 381 thousand km. Aldebaran has a diameter of almost 60 million km. The huge star Betelgeuse is 1000 times larger than our Sun. The size of this supergiant exceeds the size of the solar system.

Proxima Centauri is considered the closest neighbor of our star in the quarter, to which you will need to fly at the speed of light on the order of 4 years.

The sun, due to its huge mass, keeps eight planets near it, many of which, in turn, have their own systems. The position of objects moving around the Sun is clearly demonstrated by the diagram of the solar system. Almost all the planets in the solar system move around our star in the same direction, along with the rotating Sun. The orbits of the planets are practically in the same plane, have different shapes and move around the center of the system at different speeds. The movement around the Sun is counterclockwise and in the same plane. Only comets and other objects, mostly located in the Kuiper belt, have orbits with a large angle of inclination to the plane of the ecliptic.

Today we know exactly how many planets there are in the solar system, there are 8 of them. All the celestial bodies of the solar system are at a certain distance from the sun, periodically receding or approaching it. Accordingly, each of the planets has its own, different from the others, astrophysical parameters and characteristics. It should be noted that 6 out of 8 planets of the solar system rotate around their axis in the direction in which our star revolves around its own axis. Only Venus and Uranus rotate in the opposite direction. In addition, Uranus is the only planet in the solar system that practically lies on its side. Its axis has an inclination of 90° to the line of the ecliptic.

The first model of the solar system was demonstrated by Nicolaus Copernicus. In his view, the Sun was the central object of our world, around which other planets revolve, including our Earth. Subsequently, Kepler, Galileo, Newton improved this model by placing objects in it in accordance with mathematical and physical laws.

Looking at the presented model, one can imagine that the orbits of space objects are located at equal distances from each other. The solar system looks completely different in nature. The greater the distance to the planets of the solar system from the Sun, the greater the distance between the orbit of the previous celestial object. Visualize the scale of the solar system, allows the table of distances of objects from the center of our star system.

As the distance from the Sun increases, the rate of rotation of the planets around the center of the solar system slows down. Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, takes only 88 Earth days to complete one revolution around our star. Neptune, located at a distance of 4.5 billion kilometers from the Sun, makes a complete revolution in 165 Earth years.

Despite the fact that we are dealing with a heliocentric model of the solar system, many planets have their own systems, consisting of natural satellites and rings. Satellites of the planets move around the parent planets and obey the same laws.

Most of the satellites of the solar system synchronously revolve around their planets, always turning to them with one side. The moon is also always turned to the Earth with one side.

Only two planets, Mercury and Venus, do not have natural satellites. Mercury is even smaller than some of its moons.

Center and boundaries of the solar system

The main and central object of our system is the Sun. It has a complex structure and consists of 92% hydrogen. Only 7% is useful for helium atoms, which, when interacting with hydrogen atoms, become fuel for an endless nuclear chain reaction. In the center of the star there is a core with a diameter of 150-170 thousand km, heated to a temperature of 14 million K.

A brief description of the star will be reduced to a few words: it is a huge thermonuclear natural reactor. Moving from the center of the star to its outer edge, we find ourselves in the convective zone, where energy transfer and plasma mixing take place. This layer has a temperature of 5800K. The visible part of the Sun is the photosphere and chromosphere. Crowning our star is the solar corona, which is the outer shell. The processes occurring inside the Sun affect the entire state of the solar system. Its light warms our planet, the force of attraction and gravity keep objects of near space at a certain distance from each other. As the intensity of internal processes decreases, our star will begin to cool. Consumable stellar material will lose its density, which will lead to the expansion of the body of the star. Instead of a yellow dwarf, our Sun will turn into a huge Red Giant. While our Sun remains the same hot and bright star.

The boundary of the realm of our star is the Kuiper belt and the Oort cloud. These are extremely remote regions of outer space, to which the influence of the Sun extends. In the Kuiper belt and in the Oort Cloud there are a lot of other objects of various sizes, which in one way or another affect the processes occurring inside the solar system.

The Oort cloud is a hypothetical spherical space that surrounds the solar system along its entire outer diameter. The distance to this region of space is more than 2 light years. This region is home to comets. It is from there that these rare space guests, long-period comets, fly to us.

The Kuiper belt contains the residual material that was used in the formation of the solar system. Basically, these are small particles of space ice, a cloud of frozen gas (methane and ammonia). There are also large objects in this area, some of which are dwarf planets, smaller fragments, similar in structure to asteroids. The main known objects of the belt are the dwarf planets of the solar system Pluto, Haumea and Makemake. The spacecraft will be able to fly to them in one light year.

Between the Kuiper belt and deep space at the outer edges of the belt, there is a very rarefied region, mainly composed of remnants of cosmic ice and gas.

To date, the existence in this region of our star system of large trans-Neptunian space objects, one of which is the dwarf planet Sedna, is allowed.

Brief description of the planets of the solar system

Scientists have calculated that the mass of all the planets belonging to our star is no more than 0.1% of the mass of the Sun. However, even among this small amount, 99% of the mass falls on the two largest space objects after the Sun - the planets Jupiter and Saturn. The sizes of the planets in the solar system are very different. Among them there are babies and giants, in their structure and astrophysical parameters similar to failed stars.

In astronomy, it is customary to divide all 8 planets into two groups:

• planets with a stone structure belong to the planets of the Earth group;
• planets, which are dense clumps of gas, belong to the group of gas giant planets.

Previously, it was believed that the system of our star includes 9 planets. Only very recently, at the end of the 20th century, Pluto was classified as a dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt. Therefore, the question of how many planets are in the solar system today can be firmly answered - eight.

If we arrange the planets of the solar system in order, the map of our world will look like this:

• Venus;
• Earth;
• Jupiter;
• Saturn;
• Uranus;

In the very middle of this parade of planets is the asteroid belt. According to scientists, these are the remains of a planet that existed in the early stages of the solar system, but died as a result of a cosmic cataclysm.

The inner planets Mercury, Venus and Earth are the planets closest to the Sun, closer than the rest of the objects in the solar system, therefore they are completely dependent on the processes taking place on our star. At some distance from them is the ancient God of War - the planet Mars. All four planets are united by the similarity in structure and the identity of astrophysical parameters, therefore they are classified as planets of the Earth group.

Mercury - a close neighbor of the Sun - is a hot frying pan. Paradoxical is the fact that, despite its close location to a hot star, Mercury has the most significant temperature drops in our system. During the day, the surface of the planet heats up to 350 degrees Celsius, and at night the cosmic cold rages with a temperature of -170.2 ° C. Venus is a real boiling cauldron, where there is a huge pressure and high temperatures. Despite its gloomy and dull appearance, Mars is of the greatest interest to scientists today. The composition of its atmosphere, astrophysical parameters similar to those of the earth, and the presence of seasons give hope for the subsequent development and colonization of the planet by representatives of terrestrial civilization.

Gas giants, which for the most part are planets without a solid shell, are interesting for their satellites. Some of them, according to scientists, may represent space territories where, under certain conditions, the emergence of life is possible.

The planets of the terrestrial group are separated from the four gas planets by the asteroid belt - the inner boundary, beyond which lies the realm of the gas giants. Next to the asteroid belt, Jupiter, with its attraction, balances our solar system. This planet is the largest, largest and densest in the solar system. Jupiter's diameter is 140,000 km across. This is five times more than our planet. This gas giant has its own system of satellites, of which there are about 69 pieces. Among them, real giants stand out: the two largest satellites of Jupiter - Ganymede and Calypso - are larger than the planet Mercury.

Saturn - the brother of Jupiter - also has a huge size - 116 thousand km. in diameter. Saturn's retinue is no less impressive - 62 satellites. However, this giant stands out in the night sky for another - a wonderful system of rings encircling the planet. Titan is one of the largest moons in the solar system. This giant has a diameter of more than 10 thousand km. Among the realm of hydrogen, nitrogen and ammonia, there can be no known life forms. However, unlike their host, Saturn's moons have a rocky structure and a hard surface. Some of them have an atmosphere, Enceladus is even supposed to have water.

Continue a series of giant planets Uranus and Neptune. These are cold dark worlds. Unlike Jupiter and Saturn, where hydrogen predominates, methane and ammonia are in the atmosphere here. Instead of condensed gas, Uranus and Neptune have high-temperature ice. In view of this, both planets were singled out in one group - ice giants. Uranus is second in size only to Jupiter, Saturn and Neptune. The orbit of Neptune has a diameter of almost 9 billion kilometers. The planet takes 164 Earth years to go around the Sun.

Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune present the most interesting objects for scientists to study today.

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Despite the huge amount of knowledge that mankind has today, the achievements of modern means of observation and research, there are still a lot of unresolved issues. What is the actual solar system, which of the planets may later turn out to be suitable for life?

Man continues to observe the nearest space, making more and more new discoveries. In December 2012, the whole world could watch an enchanting astronomical show - a parade of planets. During this period, all 7 planets of our solar system could be seen in the night sky, including even such distant ones as Uranus and Neptune.

A closer study today is carried out with the help of automatic space probes and devices. Many of them have already managed not only to fly to the most extreme regions of our star system, but also beyond it. The first artificially created space objects that managed to reach the borders of the solar system were the American probes Pioneer-10 and Pioneer-11.

It is interesting to theoretically suggest how far these devices can go beyond the borders? Launched in 1977, the American automatic probe Voyager 1, after 40 years of work on the study of the planets, became the first spacecraft to leave our system.

Our home in space is the solar system, a star system made up of eight planets and part of the Milky Way galaxy. In the center is a star called the Sun. Age solar system four and a half billion years. We live on the third planet from the sun. Do you know about other planets in the solar system? Now we will tell you a little about them.

Mercury is the smallest planet in the solar system. Its radius is 2440 km. The period of revolution around the Sun is 88 Earth days. During this time, Mercury has time to complete a revolution around its own axis only one and a half times. A day on Mercury lasts approximately 59 Earth days. The orbit of Mercury is one of the most unstable: not only the speed of movement and its distance from the Sun change there, but also the position itself. There are no satellites.

Neptune is the eighth planet in the solar system. It is close enough to Uranus. The radius of the planet is 24547 km. A year on Neptune is equal to 60190 days, that is, somewhere around 164 Earth years. Has 14 satellites. It has an atmosphere in which the strongest wind is recorded - up to 260 m / s.
By the way, Neptune was discovered not with the help of observations, but through mathematical calculations.

Uranus is the seventh planet in the solar system. Radius - 25267 km. The coldest planet is a surface temperature of -224 degrees. A year on Uranus is equal to 30,685 Earth days, that is, approximately 84 years. Day - 17 hours. Has 27 satellites.

Saturn is the sixth planet in the solar system. The radius of the planet is 57350 km. It is the second largest after Jupiter. A year on Saturn is equal to 10759 days, which is almost 30 Earth years. A day on Saturn is almost equal to a day on Jupiter - 10.5 Earth hours. Most similar to the Sun in the composition of chemical elements.
Has 62 satellites.
The main feature of Saturn is its rings. Their origin has not yet been established.

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun. It is the largest planet in the solar system. The radius of Jupiter is 69912 km. This is already 19 times larger than the Earth. A year there lasts as much as 4333 Earth days, that is, almost incomplete 12 years. A day has a duration of about 10 Earth hours.
Jupiter has 67 moons. The largest of them are Callisto, Ganymede, Io and Europa. At the same time, Ganymede is 8% larger than Mercury, the smallest planet in our system, and has an atmosphere.

Mars is the fourth planet in the solar system. Its radius is 3390 km, which is almost half the size of the Earth. A year on Mars is 687 Earth days. It has 2 satellites - Phobos and Deimos.
The atmosphere of the planet is rarefied. The water found on some parts of the surface suggests that some kind of primitive life on Mars was once before or even exists now.

Venus is the second planet in the solar system. It is similar in mass and radius to the Earth. There are no satellites.
The atmosphere of Venus is almost entirely composed of carbon dioxide. The percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is 96%, nitrogen is approximately 4%. Water vapor and oxygen are also present, but in very small quantities. Due to the fact that such an atmosphere creates a greenhouse effect, the temperature on the surface of the planet reaches 475 ° C. A day on Venus is equal to 243 Earth days. A year on Venus is 255 days.

Pluto is a dwarf planet at the edges of the solar system, which is the dominant object in a distant system of 6 small cosmic bodies. The radius of the planet is 1195 km. The period of revolution of Pluto around the Sun is approximately 248 Earth years. A day on Pluto is 152 hours. The mass of the planet is approximately 0.0025 of the mass of the Earth.
It is noteworthy that Pluto was excluded from the category of planets in 2006 due to the fact that in the Kuiper belt there are objects that are larger or equal in size to Pluto, which is why, even if it is taken as a full-fledged planet, then in this case it is necessary add Eris to this category - it has almost the same size as Pluto.

Hello dear readers! This post will focus on the structure of the solar system. I believe that it is simply necessary to know where our planet is in the Universe, and also what else is in our solar system besides the planets ...

The structure of the solar system.

solar system- this is a system of cosmic bodies, which, in addition to the central luminary - the Sun, includes nine large planets, their satellites, many small planets, comets, cosmic dust and small meteoroids that move in the sphere of the predominant gravitational action of the Sun.

In the middle of the 16th century, the general structure of the structure of the solar system was revealed by the Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. He refuted the idea that the Earth is the center of the universe and substantiated the idea of ​​the movement of the planets around the Sun. This model of the solar system is called heliocentric.

In the 17th century, Kepler discovered the law of planetary motion, and Newton formulated the law of universal attraction. But only after Galileo invented the telescope in 1609, it became possible to study the physical characteristics that make up the solar system, cosmic bodies.

So Galileo, observing sunspots, first discovered the rotation of the Sun around its axis.

Planet Earth is one of nine celestial bodies (or planets) that move around the Sun in outer space.

Planets make up the bulk of the solar system, which rotate around the Sun at different speeds in the same direction and almost in the same plane along elliptical orbits and are located at different distances from it.

The planets are in the following order from the Sun: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto. But Pluto sometimes moves away from the Sun by more than 7 billion km, but due to the enormous mass of the Sun, which is almost 750 times the mass of all other planets, it remains in its sphere of attraction.

The largest of the planets is Jupiter. Its diameter is 11 times the diameter of the Earth and is 142,800 km. The smallest of the planets is Pluto, whose diameter is only 2,284 km.

The planets that are closest to the Sun (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars) are very different from the next four. They are called terrestrial planets, since, like the Earth, they are composed of solid rocks.

Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, are called Jupiter type planets, as well as giant planets, and unlike them, they consist mainly of hydrogen.

There are also other differences between Jupiter and Earth type planets."Jupiterians" together with numerous satellites form their own "solar systems".

Saturn has at least 22 moons. And only three satellites, including the Moon, have terrestrial planets. And above all, Jupiter-type planets are surrounded by rings.

Planet debris.

Between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter there is a large gap where one more planet could be placed. This space, in fact, is filled with many small celestial bodies, which are called asteroids, or minor planets.

Ceres is the name of the largest asteroid, with a diameter of about 1000 km. To date, 2500 asteroids have been discovered, which are much smaller than Ceres in size. These are blocks with diameters that do not exceed several kilometers in size.

Most asteroids revolve around the sun in a wide "asteroid belt" that lies between Mars and Jupiter. The orbits of some asteroids go far beyond this belt, and sometimes come quite close to the Earth.

These asteroids cannot be seen with the naked eye because they are too small and very far away from us. But other debris, such as comets, can be seen in the night sky due to their bright glow.

Comets are celestial bodies that are made up of ice, solid particles, and dust. Most of the time, the comet moves in the far reaches of our solar system and is invisible to the human eye, but when it approaches the Sun, it begins to glow.

This happens under the influence of solar heat. The ice partially evaporates and turns into a gas, releasing dust particles. The comet becomes visible because the gas and dust cloud reflects sunlight. The cloud, under the pressure of the solar wind, turns into a fluttering long tail.

There are also such space objects that can be observed almost every evening. They burn up when they enter the Earth's atmosphere, leaving a narrow luminous trail in the sky - a meteor. These bodies are called meteoroids, and their size is no larger than a grain of sand.

Meteorites are large meteoroids that reach the earth's surface. Due to the collision of huge meteorites with the Earth, in the distant past, huge craters formed on its surface. Almost a million tons of meteorite dust falls on Earth every year.

Birth of the solar system.

Large gas and dust nebulae, or clouds, are scattered among the stars of our galaxy. In the same cloud, about 4600 million years ago, Our solar system was born.This birth occurred as a result of the collapse (compression) of this cloud under the action of I eat the forces of gravity.

Then this cloud began to rotate. And over time, it turned into a rotating disk, the bulk of the substance of which was concentrated in the center. The gravitational collapse continued, the central compaction was constantly decreasing and warming up.

The thermonuclear reaction began at a temperature of tens of millions of degrees, and then the central density of matter flared up as a new star - the Sun.

The planets formed from dust and gas in the disk. The collision of dust particles, as well as their transformation into large lumps, took place in the internal heated areas. This process is called accretion.

The mutual attraction and collision of all these blocks led to the formation of terrestrial-type planets.

These planets had a weak gravitational field and were too small to attract light gases (such as helium and hydrogen) that make up the accretion disk.

The birth of the solar system was a common occurrence - similar systems are born all the time and everywhere in the universe. And maybe in one of these systems there is a planet similar to Earth, on which there is intelligent life ...

So we examined the structure of the solar system, and now we can arm ourselves with knowledge for their further application in practice 😉