The Nine Planets and their Moons

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The Nine Planets and their Moons

• By Sara Miller Tammi Myers

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Mercury

• Similar to our moon very heavily cratered
• Unstable and thin atmosphere
• Wide temperature ranges 90K to 700K
• No known satellites

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Venus

• Earths sister planet (both young, similar
  densities and chemical compositions)
• very circular orbit
• slow, retrograde rotation
• no known satellites

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Earth

• Densest major body in solar system
• 71 of surface is covered with water
• One natural satellite several thousand
  artificial satellites

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Earths Moon

• Synchronous rotation same side of moon always
  faces the Earth
• No atmosphere or magnetic field
• Maria huge impact craters
• Regolithsurface dust created by impacts

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Mars

• Elliptical orbit
• Surface consists of highlands and plains
• Evidence of erosion
• Thin atmosphere
• Ice caps at poles

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Phobos Deimos

• Composed of a mixture of rock and ice
• Believed to be captured asteroids
• Phobos will crash into Mars in about 50 million
  years

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Jupiter

• Largest planet in solar system
• High velocity winds create wide bands
• Barely visible rings around planet
• As large as a gas planet can be

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Io

• Composed of molten silicate rock
• Has active volcanic calderas (craters formed by
  collapse of a volcanic vent)

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Europa

• Composed of silicate rock with thin outer layer
  of ice
• Smooth very few surface features
• Dark streaks possibly produced by geysers or
  volcanic activity

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Ganymede

• Icy shell, silicate mantle, and iron core
• Has several craters
• Two types of terrain old, highly cratered
  regions and young areas with grooves and ridges

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Callisto

• 40 ice and 60 rock and iron
• Very heavily cratered
• No change in surface for over 4 billion years
• CO2 atmosphere

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Saturn

• Least dense of all planets 75 hydrogen and 25
  helium
• Obvious bands caused by small particles in orbit
• 18 known satellites

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Titan

• Saturns largest satellite
• Thick opaque atmosphere
• Ethane ocean created by preciptation of ethane
  clouds

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Uranus

• Axis is nearly parallel to ecliptic
• Composed of rock and ice
• Blue color is due to absorption of red light by
  methane in atmosphere
• Has 15 satellites

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Titania

• 40 to 50 ice and remaining composition is rock
• Craters and interconnected valleys
• Very young surface

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Oberon

• Also 40 to 50 ice with remaining rock
• Large faults in southern hemisphere
• Heavily cratered
• Stable surface

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Neptune

• Sometimes crosses Plutos orbit to become last
  planet in solar system
• Icy composition with 15 hydrogen
• Eight known satellites

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Triton

• Retrograde orbit
• Very cold and young surface
• Very few craters
• May eventually crash into Neptune

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Pluto

• Eccentric orbit
• Very, very cold
• Not well studied
• One known satellite

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Charon

• Synchronous rotation same side always face Pluto
• Low density and probably icy