Question

Answer the following questions. Be sure to answer in your own words. No credit will be given for answers that are copied from the textbook or the internet. Also, base your answers on the course materials. Do not google the questions or use Wikipedia. No credit will be given for answers (even correct ones) based on other sources.

1) Name five physical differences between the terrestrial planets and the Jovian planets (remember that "Earth-like" and "Jupiter-like" refer to the names and are not physical differences).

2) What is an astronomical unit? Write down the distances from the Sun, in astronomical units, for each planet in our solar system.

3) Do all asteroids lie between Mars and Jupiter? (Answer with more than just "yes" or "no".)

4) Why is it important for astronomers to catalog and track as many asteroids as possible?

5) What planets are asteroids and meteoroids like? Comets are like the moons of what planets?

6) Describe the difference between a meteor and a meteorite.

7) Describe what a comet is.

8) Which way do the tails of a comet point?

9) See the "Table of Moons" the "Links" section. When were most of Jupiter's moons discovered? Why couldn't they have been discovered sooner?

You can use the internet for questions 10, 11, and 13.

10) What is the name of the object that the Dawn spacecraft visited in 2011? What type of object is this? What object did the Dawn spacecraft visit in March 2015? What type of object is this?
11) What important thing did the Rosetta spacecraft do in November 2014?

12) If you were on a mission to visit an asteroid, and maybe walk around it, what would be some of the challenges you might face?

13) What was the first spacecraft to visit Pluto? When did it fly by Pluto? How close did it get?

Answer 1

Answer to question no 1)

1. Jovian planets have many moons, while terrestrial planets only have a few moons.

2. Terrestrial planets are close together while Jovian planets are spread out.

3. Jovian planets have rings while terrestrial planets do not.

4. Terrestrial planets have rocky surfaces while jovian planets have gaseous surfaces.

5. Terrestrial planets are closer to the Sun while jovians are not closer.

Answer to question 2.

The astronomical unit is defined to beequal to the distance from the Earth to the sun (which is about 150,000,000km or 1 A.U.)

The distances from the sun to each planet is as follows:

Mercury = .4 A.U.

Venus = .7 A.U.

Earth = 1 A.U.

Jupiter = 5 A.U.

Satum = 10 A.U.

Uranus = 19 A.U.

Neptune = 30 A.U.

Pluto = 40 A.U.

Answer to question 3)

The asteroid belt is between the Mars and Jupiter that is why most asteroids lie between them.

Answer to question 4).

It is important for astronomers to catalog & track as many asteroids as possible because, for them iy makes their study easy and they leam more about their origin.