Structure of a Comet

As a comet approaches the Sun, ice begins to boil, releasing dust and gas from the rocky nucleus. The dust and gas create tails
millions of times larger than the nucleus. The tails of some comets are large enough and reflect enough light to be visible from Earth.
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Global Map of Venus

The planet Venus is shrouded in a thick atmosphere, but the United States spacecraft Magellan peered under the clouds from 1990 to
1992 and used radar to map the planet’s surface.
CorbisCorbis/NASA
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Surface of Venus Detail

Using radar to map the surface of Venus, the space probe Magellan provided scientists with the first close-up images of the planet.
This image shows lava flows, which cover much of the surface of Venus. The volcanoes Sif Mons and Gula Mons are visible in the
background.
Corbis
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Mars
The most detailed information available about Mars has come from unpiloted spacecraft sent to the planet by the United States
between 1964 and 1976. From this data, scientists have determined that the planet’s atmosphere consists primarily of carbon dioxide,
with small amounts of nitrogen, oxygen, water vapor, and other gases. Because the atmosphere is extremely thin, daily temperatures
can vary as much as 100 Celsius degrees (190 Fahrenheit degrees). In general, surface temperatures are too cold and surface pressures
too low for water to exist in a liquid state on Mars. The planet resembles a cold, high-altitude desert.
NASA
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Olympus Mons
Olympus Mons, in the Tharsis region of Mars, is the highest known mountain in the solar system, rising 26 km (16 mi) above the
surrounding plain and measuring 600 km (375 mi) across at the base. It is a shield volcano, now extinct, that built up over millions of
years in successive eruptions.
Corbis/NASA
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Water on Mars?
Scientists believe these channels in a crater wall on Mars were formed by water. The sharpness of the features and the lack of small
impact craters covering them imply that the channels formed relatively recently in the history of the planet. Liquid water, therefore,
may still exist below the surface of Mars.
Photo Researchers, Inc./NASA/Science Photo Library
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
North Pole of Mars
Viking orbiters took more than 50,000 photos of Mars, mapping almost the entire surface of the planet. The north pole of Mars is
covered by a cap of water ice all year and by a layer of solid carbon dioxide during the Martian winter.
Photo Researchers, Inc./NASA
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Jupiter and its Moons

Jupiter is the largest of the planets, with a volume more than 1,300 times greater than that of Earth. Jupiter’s colorful bands are caused
by strong atmospheric currents and accentuated by a dense cloud cover. The massive planet, upper right, is shown here with its four
largest satellites: Io, upper left, Ganymede, lower left, Europa, center, and Callisto, lower right.
Photo Researchers, Inc./NASA/Science Source
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Jupiter from Pioneer 10
The United States space probe Pioneer 10 took some of the first close-up images of Jupiter and its moons when it passed Jupiter in
December 1973. The planet Jupiter gets its banded appearance from atmospheric currents that move Jupiter’s clouds at different
speeds at different latitudes.
NASA
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Great Red Spot

Jupiter’s atmosphere is composed mostly of hydrogen and helium with lesser amounts of minor gases. White clouds of frozen
ammonia crystals and other colored clouds, including the Great Red Spot, swirl around in atmospheric currents as the planet rotates.
The Great Red Spot was photographed by Voyager 1 in 1979.
Photo Researchers, Inc./NASA/Science Source
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Cassini-Huygens Mission
The Cassini-Huygens mission, shown here in an artist's depiction, was launched in 1997 and arrived at the planet Saturn in 2004.
Cassini, the orbiter part of the spacecraft, will circle Saturn for several years while studying the planet and its moons. Huygens is a
probe that will plunge into the atmosphere of Titan, Saturn's largest moon.
NASA
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Saturn’s Atmosphere
This infrared photo of the planet Saturn has been color coded to indicate the cloud level in Saturn’s atmosphere. Violet and blue
represent areas in which Saturn’s atmopshere is clear down to the main cloud layer. Green and yellow show layers of haze above the
main cloud layer (yellow represents thicker haze). Red and orange indicate the highest level of clouds, thicker than the haze. White
areas are areas of the atmosphere with high levels of water vapor. The bright dots at the upper right and lower left of the picture are
Saturn’s satellites Tethys and Dione, respectively. The Hubble Space Telescope took this image in 1998.
Material created with support to AURA/ST Sci from NASA contract NAS5-26555 is reproduced here with permission/Courtesy of E.
Karkoschka (University of Arizona), and NASA
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Rings of Saturn
Saturn’s rings are extremely wide, but very flat, bands created by orbiting fragments of rock, gas, and ice. Close examination reveals
that there are hundreds of thousands of separate ringlets. The Cassini spacecraft captured this enhanced view as it orbited the planet in
2004.
NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
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Uranus and its Moons
The planet Uranus (the bright blue object) is surrounded by its five largest satellites clockwise from top left, Ariel, Umbriel, Oberon,
Titania, and Miranda, in this collage created from photographs taken by the United States Voyager 2 spacecraft in 1986.
NASA
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Neptune’s Atmosphere
The 1989 Voyager 2 mission produced this false-color image of Neptune showing the different components of Neptune’s atmosphere.
The red layer shows scattered sunlight from a haze around the planet, the blue/green indicates methane, and the white areas are high-
level clouds that reflect sunlight above the atmosphere.
Photo Researchers, Inc./NASA/Science Source
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