Earth Science

An overview of the

Solar System

The Sun

The sun is the biggest, brightest, and hottest object in the solar system. The sun is an ordinary star. The sun is made of about 70% hydrogen and 28% helium.

Mercury

Mercury is solid and is covered with craters. Mercury has almost no atmosphere. Mercury is the eighth largest planet.

Venus

Venus is the sixth largest planet. Its about three-fourths the size of earth. The surface is rocky and very hot. The atmosphere completely hides the surface and traps the heat.

Earth

Earth is the fifth largest planet and the third from the sun. Liquid covers 71 percent of the Earths surface. The Earth has one moon.

Moon

Mars

Mars is the fourth planet from the sun. Mars has a thin atmosphere that contains mostly carbon dioxide. Mars has two small moons.

Moons of Mars
Phobos

Deimos

Jupiter

Jupiters Red Spot

The Great Red Spot, a huge storm of swirling gas that has lasted for hundreds of years. Jupiter does not have a solid surface. The planet is a ball of liquid surrounded by gas.

Moons of Jupiter
Jupiter has four large Galilean moons, twelve smaller named moons and twentythree more recently discovered but not named moons. Well take a look at the four large Galilean moons which were first observed by Galileo in 1610.

Io

Io is the fifth moon of Jupiter. Its the third largest of Jupiters moons. Io has hundreds of volcanic calderas. Some of the volcanoes are active.

Europa

Europa is the sixth of Jupiters moons and is the fourth largest. It is slightly smaller than the Earths moon. The surface strongly resembles images of sea ice on Earth. There may be a liquid water sea under the crust. Europa is one of the five known moons in the solar system to have an atmosphere.

Ganymede

Ganymede is the seventh and largest of Jupiters known satellites. Ganymede has extensive cratering and an icy crust.

Callisto

Callisto is the eighth of Jupiters known satellites and the second largest. Callisto has the oldest, most cratered surface of any body yet observed in the solar system.

Saturn

Saturn is the second largest planet and the sixth from the sun. Saturn is made of materials that are lighter than water. If you could fit Saturn in a lake, it would float!

Rings of Saturn

Saturns rings are not solid; they are composed of small countless particles. The rings are very thin. Though theyre 250,000km or more in diameter, theyre less than one kilometer thick.

Uranus

Uranus is the third largest planet and the seventh from the sun. Uranus is one of the giant gas planets. Uranus is blue-green because of the methane in its atmosphere.

Neptune

Neptune is the fourth largest planet and the eight from the sun. Because of the orbits, from 1979 to 1999, Neptune was the ninth planet. Like Uranus, the methane gives Neptune its color.

Pluto

Pluto is the smallest planet and usually the farthest from the sun. Pluto is the only planet that has not been visited by a spacecraft.