Solar System Facts: A Guide to Things

Orbiting Our Sun

The solar system is made up of the sun and everything that

orbits around it, including planets, moons, asteroids, comets
and meteoroids. It extends from the sun, called Sol by the
ancient Romans, and goes past the four inner planets,
through the Asteroid Belt to the four gas giants and on to the
disk-shaped Kuiper Belt and far beyond to the giant,
spherical Oort Cloud and the teardrop-shaped heliopause.
Scientists estimate that the edge of the solar system is
about 9 billion miles (15 billion kilometers) from the sun.
Discovery

For millennia, astronomers have followed points of light that

seemed to move among the stars. The ancient Greeks
named these planets, meaning "wanderers." Mercury, Venus,
Mars, Jupiter and Saturn were known in antiquity, and the
invention of the telescope added the Asteroid Belt, Uranus,
Neptune, Pluto and many of these worlds' moons. The dawn
of the space age saw dozens of probes launched to explore
our system, an adventure that continues today. Only one
spacecraft so far, Voyager 1, has crossed the threshold into
interstellar space.

Planet Mercury

Mercury is the closest planet to the sun. As such, it circles

the sun faster than all the other planets, which is why
Romans named it after their swift-footed messenger god.

The Sumerians also knew of Mercury since at least 5,000

years ago. It was often associated with Nabu, the god of
writing. Mercury was also given separate names for its
appearance as both a morning star and as an evening star.
Greek astronomers knew, however, that the two names

referred to the same body, and Heraclitus, around 500 B.C.,

correctly thought that both Mercury and Venus orbited the
sun, not Earth.

Planet Venus

Venus, the second planet from the sun, is named for the
Roman goddess of love and beauty. The planet — the only
planet named after a female — may have been named for the
most beautiful deity of her pantheon because it shone the
brightest of the five planets known to ancient astronomers.

In ancient times, Venus was often thought to be two

different stars, the evening star and the morning star — that
is, the ones that first appeared at sunset and sunrise. In
Latin, they were respectively known as Vesper and Lucifer.
In Christian times, Lucifer, or "light-bringer," became known
as the name of Satan before his fall. However, further
observations of Venus in the space age show a very hellish
environment. This makes Venus a very difficult planet to
observe from up close, because spacecraft do not survive
long on its surface.

Planet Earth

Earth, our home, is the third planet from the sun. It is the
only planet known to have an atmosphere containing free
oxygen, oceans of liquid water on its surface, and, of course,
life

Planet Jupiter

Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. Fittingly, it

was named after the king of the gods in Roman mythology. In
a similar manner, the ancient Greeks named the planet after
Zeus, the king of the Greek pantheon.

Jupiter helped revolutionize the way we saw the universe

and ourselves in 1610, when Galileo discovered Jupiter's
four large moons — Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, now
known as the Galilean moons. This was the first time that
celestial bodies were seen circling an object other than
Earth,
 major support of the Copernican view that Earth was not
the center of the univers

Planet Saturn

Saturn is the sixth planet from the sun and the second
largest planet in the solar system. Saturn was the Roman
name for Cronus, the lord of the Titans in Greek mythology.
Saturn is the root of the English word "Saturday."

Saturn is the farthest planet from Earth visible to the naked

human eye, but it is through a telescope that the planet's
most outstanding features can be seen: Saturn's rings.
Although the other gas giants in the solar system — Jupiter,
Uranus and Neptune — also have rings, those of Saturn are
without a doubt the most extraordinary.

Planet Uranus
Uranus is the seventh planet from the sun and the first to be
discovered by scientists. Although Uranus is visible to the
naked eye, it was long mistaken as a star because of the
planet's dimness and slow orbit. The planet is also notable
for its dramatic tilt, which causes its axis to point nearly
directly at the sun

Planet Neptune
Neptune is the eighth planet from the sun. It was the first
planet to get its existence predicted by mathematical
calculations before it was actually seen through a telescope
on Sept. 23, 1846. Irregularities in the orbit of Uranus led
French astronomer Alexis Bouvard to suggest that the
gravitational pull from another celestial body might be
responsible. German astronomer Johann Galle then relied on
subsequent calculations to help spot Neptune via telescope.
Previously, astronomer Galileo Galilei sketched the planet,
but he mistook it for a star due to its slow motion. In

accordance with all the other planets seen in the sky, this
new world was
given a name from Greek and Roman mythology — Neptune,
the Roman god of the sea.

Dwarf Planet Pluto

Pluto, once considered the ninth and most distant planet
from the sun, is now the largest known dwarf planet in the
solar system. It is also one of the largest known members of
the Kuiper Belt, a shadowy zone beyond the orbit of Neptune
thought to be populated by hundreds of thousands of rocky,
icy bodies each larger than 62 miles (100 kilometers) across,
along with 1 trillion or more comets.

The Moon
The moon is the easiest celestial object to find in the night
sky — when it's there. Earth's only natural satellite hovers
above us bright and round until it seemingly disappears for a
few nights. The rhythm of the moon's phases has guided
humanity for millennia — for instance, calendar months are
roughly equal to the time it takes to go from one full moon to
the next