Age of the Solar System

- The solar system is 4.56 billion years old - know this due to the radioactivity
- Atoms are made of negatively charged electrons surrounding a nucleus of positively
charged protons and uncharged neutrons
- If the proton-to-neutron ratio is too high or too low, the nucleus is unstable, and will
eventually undergo radioactive decay to a lower energy nucleus
- The half-life is the time span over which the nucleus has a 50% chance to decay; it is
different for different unstable nuclei
- Example: Carbon-14 (8 neutrons, 6 protons) has too high a ration of neutrons to
protons to be stable
- It decays into nitrogen-14 (7 neutrons, 7 protons) plus an electron, with a half-life
of about 6000 years
- The ratio of carbon-14 to normal carbon-12 (6 neutrons, 6 protons) serves as the
basis of carbon dating
- Carbon-14 is produced in the atmosphere and incorporated into plants when they
absorb carbon dioxide
- Dead plants don’t absorb any new carbon-14, so the older the organic matter, the
less carbon-14 it has
- Potassium-40 (19 protons and 21 neutrons) doesn't have a high enough ratio of
neutrons to protons, so it decays to Argon-40 (18 protons and 22 neutrons) plus
an anti-electron, with a half-life of 1.25 billion years
- Argon is an inert gas (used to preserve valuable historical documents) which
never combines with other elements
- So the ratio of Potassium-40 and Argon-40 tells you the age of a rock from the
Earth, Moon, or anywhere
- Example: if you find a rock with equal amounts of Potassium-40 and
Argon-40, that rock formed 1.25 billion years ago
- Using these and other radioactive decay products, we know that the oldest rocks
found on the Earth and Moon are about 4.4 billion years old and the oldest
meteorites are 4.56 billion years old
- Applying the same kinds of techniques to stars shows that the oldest stars, and
thus the Universe, are approximately 14 billion years old

Solar System Overview

- The solar system is the Sun (Sol), the planets and their moons, plus meteoroids,
asteroids, Kuiper belt objects (icy asteroids), and comets
- 99.9% of the solar system's mass is in the Sun
- The distances between planets are much larger than the sizes of planets
- All solar system objects (except long-period comets) orbit the Sun in the same direction
(counterclockwise when viewed from above the Sun's north pole) and in roughly the
same plane
- The planets are divided into terrestrial and jovian (also called 'gas giant') categories that
differ in their size, density, composition, distance from the Sun as given by their semi-
major axis 'a' (measured in astronomical units or AU)
- The density ρ (greek letter rho) of an object is mass divided by volume:
- ρ = Mass ÷ Volume
- 1 kg of lead has the same mass as 1 kg of feathers, but the feathers occupy a larger
volume and so have a lower density.
- The terrestrial (from the Latin terra) planets are the four closest to the Sun: Mercury,
Venus, Earth, Mars (a < 2 AU). They are small, high-density, and rocky
- Asteroids have diameters in range 100 m to 1000 km; made of rock or rock + ice +
carbon-based compounds. The largest, like Vesta, are close to spherical. Some smaller
asteroids are just 'rubble piles'
- Meteoroids have diameters d < 100 m (small pieces of asteroids or comets); meteoroids
become meteors when they burn up in Earth's atmosphere; meteorites are what's left of
the rare meteors which don't burn up completely in the atmosphere
- Most (but not all) asteroids & meteoroids orbit in the asteroid belt between Mars and
Jupiter
- Total mass of asteroids < mass of Moon
- The jovian (from Jove, the Roman name for Jupiter) or gas giant planets are the next
four out from the Sun: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune (5 < a < 30 AU)
- Large, low-density, and predominantly gaseous (no solid surface reachable before you'd
be crushed by incredibly high pressure gas or liquid)
- The number of moons of the jovian planets is at least 202, but the exact number
depends on the lower size limit you set for a moon
- Pluto and its moon Charon are among the largest known Kuiper belt objects (icy
asteroids). [Large Kuiper belt objects and asteroids are also called dwarf planets]
- Comets are objects made of ice, dust, and carbon-based compounds, and come from
the outer solar system (beyond the jovian planets)
- Comets produce spectacular twin tails of gas (ions) & dust when perturbed into the inner
solar system
- Long-period comets come from the Oort cloud which surrounds our solar system (like a
cloud of bugs - a cloud you can see through); orbits are randomly distributed over all
directions in space. The outer limit of the Oort cloud is located at 50,000 AU, or 0.25
light-year, from the Sun