“ASTEROIDS and METEORITES”

 Asteroids and Meteorites are members of our solar system that are solid, like planets, but are
much smaller which are revolving around the sun like planets.
 We shall see how they, like the comets, are storehouses of information about the solar
system’s origin.
 Definitely, the Meteoroids are probably chunks broken off Asteroids.

What is Asteroid?
 A rocky object revolving around the sun.
 It is smaller than a planet (this is what makes it different from terrestrial/rocky
planets.)
 Asteroids are thousands of “minor planets”, called PLATENOIDS.
 The first Asteroid were discovered on January 1, 1801 and were discovered by a
Sicilian Clergyman/Astronomer, “Giuseppe Piazzi” and was named Ceres after the
Roman goddess of harvests.
 The largest Asteroids known are the size of some of the moons of the planets. Small
Asteroids maybe only 1 km or less across, and all the Asteroids together contain less
than 0.1% of the mass of the Earth.
 Perhaps, 100,000 Asteroids could be detected with Earth-based telescopes and about
934,104 of the current known Asteroids were counted.
 The total mass of all the Asteroids combined is less than that of Earth’s Moon.
 Asteroids that come closer to Earth are called “Near Earth Objects”, NEOs for short.
 They are found between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter in the Asteroid Belt.
 An Asteroids may have struck the Earth 65 million years ago, possibly causing the
“extinction of the dinosaurs” and many other species.

ASTEROID BELT- A region between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

TROJAN ASTEROID- An Asteroids that are found in the front and behind of the planet Jupiter.

WHAT DO THEY LOOK LIKE?

 Asteroids are very irregular in shape.
 They are quite similar to small planets like phobos (a natural satellite of Mars)
 Unlike comets, they do not have cloud of diffuse light around them.

HAVE THEY HIT US BEFORE?

 Many scientists believe that Asteroids have hit the Earth many times in its history.
4 MAIN ASTEROIDS: 4 LARGEST ASTEROID
1. VESTA 1. CERES (939 km)
2. EROS 2. VESTA (525 km)
3. PALLAS 3. PALLAS (512 km)
4. JUNO 4. HYGIEA (434 km)

3 TYPES OF ASTEROIDS
 M believed to be METALLIC.
 C are thought to be CARBONAECOUS.
 S contains thought and contain more SILICATES.

METEOROIDS? METEORS? METEORITES? What’s the difference??

 The Quick Trick:
 “oids” – a quick trick from Meteoroids which are outside the atmosphere.
 “ors” – a quick trick from Meteors which are in between of the atmosphere.
 “ites” – a quick trick from Meteorites which are inside of the Earth’s surface,
meteorites are in the Earth light.

A FEW DEFINITIONS
 METEOROIDS: They are small part of rock and metal that are flying around the
solar system.
 A small chunks of matter in interplanetary space that comes from an asteroid or comet
orbiting around the sun.

 METEORS: A Latin word comes from “meteoron” which means “phenomenon in

the sky”
 A light phenomenon or a streak of light that occurs when a meteoroid burns up as it
enters Earth’s atmosphere.
 Sometimes called “shooting star”

 METEORITES: A chunks of rocks or metal that fall from space. They are named
after the place they are found.
 It is when meteor strikes the Earth surface, then it is said to be a Meteorite.
 An any object that has entered the atmosphere of another object and survived to impact
the surface.
 Most meteorites are very small but they can be huge and weigh more than a car.

METEOR SHOWERS
 Caused by debris left behind by a comet that passes close to orbit of our planet.
 There are about ONE DOZEN meteor showers occur on regular dates throughout
the year.
FIREBALLS
 It is the brightest meteors can reach 15 or 20 magnitude, brighter than the full moon.

METEORITE FALLS
 It is easily seen by its fireball or the impact of the object on the ground, and can fall with
the same probability everywhere on Earth.
 It tends to be concentrated in areas with high human population densities such as
Europe, Japan and Northern India.

NON-ASREROID METEORITES
 A small number of meteorites are made from particles from other planets. They are
known as Non-Asteroid Meteorites.

We can classify Meteorites depending on their Composition. And it is

composed of 3:
1. CHRONDITES- They are stony meteorites that have not been modified due to
melting.
2. ACHONDRITES-It is a stony meteorite which consists of material similar to
terrestrial basalts or plutonic rocks.
-They have been exposed to a high degree due to melting.
3. STONY-IRON METEORITE
-It is consisting of nearly equal parts or meteoric iron and silicates.

HAVE THEY HIT US BEFORE?

 Most meteoroids disintegrate before reaching the Earth by burning up in Earth’s
atmosphere.
 Some leave tail that lasts for several minutes large one can cause damage.

SIZES OF METEORITES:
 Tiny Meteorites less than a millimeter across, micrometeorites are the major cause of
small-scale erosion on the Moon.
 Micrometeorites also hit the Earth’s upper atmosphere all the time, and remnants can
be collected for analysis from balloons or airplanes.
 The Micrometeorites are thought to be debris from comet trails and asteroids.
 They may have been only the size of a grain of sand, reach the ground. The resulting
dust, 100 tons a day of it, can be sampled by collecting ice from the Arctic or Antarctic,
or from mountaintops.

That’s all…
THANKYOU SO MUCH FOR LISTENING!!!

Reported by: April C. Agulto BEED 3-A

Submitted to: Mr. Aaron Alipio