Smaller Bodies in the Solar SystemBy Kynsey Creel

http://www.agdesktop.com/wallpapers\space\stars\star-0005.jpg

Topics•Asteriod Belt

•Pictures

•History of Discovery

•Kuiper Belt

•Theories

•Comets

•Meteoroids

•Meteors

•Merteorites

•The Difference Between the threehttp://www.astronomy.com/asy/objects/images/hubble-galaxy-silhouettejpg.jpg

The Asteroid Belt• The Main Belt• Located roughly between Mars and Jupiter• Comprised of asteroids and minor planets

– Half the mass in 4 bodies• Ceres (smallest Dwarf Planet) 4 Vesta, 2 Pallas, 10

Hygiea – Diameter more than 400 m

• Smallest bodies range down to dust particles• Asteroids can be classified by spectra

– carbonaceous (C-type), Silicate (S-type), Metal-rich (M-type)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/InnerSolarSystem-en.png

Ceres

2 Pallas

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/__e2VLp6gwyk/SUaIeuNzilI/AAAAAAAABm8/wu2sJGWesPE/s320/275px-PallasHST2007.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/Ceres_optimized.jpg

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/astro/gallery/Vesta.jpg

4 Vesta 10 Hygiea http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_5PcuUnvp1a4/SfzS3GYRNyI/AAAAAAAAAW0/warXj5RyD4w/s400/hygiea.jpg

History of Observations• In 1800 astronomer Franz

Xaver von Zach assembled the Celestial Police

• Searching for “the missing planet” between mars and Jupiter

• Based off Predictions by Johann Daniel Titius vonWittenburg

• In 1801 Giuseppe Piazzi discovered the planet “Ceres”

• William Herschel categorized Ceres and the other dwarf planets as asteroids , “star like” Giuseppe Piazzi http://upload.wikimedia.

org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/Giuseppe_Piazzi.jpg

Kuiper Belt

• Lays outside Neptune’s orbit• Similar to Asteroid belt except much larger• Comprised of frozen volatiles

– Methane, ammonia, water (ice)– Pluto, Haumea, Makemake

• Discovered in 1992 after the discovery of Pluto (might not be alone)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Outersolarsystem_objectpositions_labels_comp.png

History and Theories• Fredrick Leonard: First

Astronomer to suggest outer Neptunian bodies

• Kenneth Edgeworth: hypothesized that the region beyond Neptune was too widely spaced for Planets

• Gerard Kuiper: suggested a “disk” outside Neptune

Gerard Kuiper

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0b/GerardKuiper.jpg

Comets

• Small Solar System bodies that orbit the sun– Orbital periods take up to hundreds of thousands

of years– Short period comets originate in the Kuiper Belt– Thrown out of the belt by gravitational pulls

• Coma (fuzzy “atmosphere”) and a tail• Ice, dust, rocky particles• Range from a few km- 10 km across• 3,648 known comets (increasing)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Comet-Hale-Bopp-29-03-1997_hires_adj.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:060227comet.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:17pHolmes_071104_eder_vga.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jupiter_showing_SL9_impact_sites.jpg

Meteoroids/Meteors/Meteorites

• Meteoroids- sand (micrometeoroids) to boulder size, part of meteor showers– Orbit the sun at various velocities– Collide with Earth if in retrograde motion at

speeds ~70km/s• Meteoroids that enter earth’s atmosphere are

meteors• Meteors that reach Earth’s surface are

meteorites

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IMG_8505n3.JPG

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Meteor_burst.jpg

Summary

http://jzholloway.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/jupitermilkyway070108-sb-1b.jpg

Asteroid Belt/Main Belt

Mars and Jupiter

Discovery by Guiseppe Piazzi

Kuiper Belt

theories behind it (Gerard Kuiper)

Comets

Meteoroids/Meteors/Meteorites

The End

Complements to wiki