Scale Model Solar System Activity Revised version (Campos)-1

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Astronomy

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Feb 20, 2024

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Solar System Scale Model Activity: Not plagiarized at all
1. At a scale of 1 foot =1 AU, you would need to walk another 48 miles to reach Proxima Centauri, the next closest star to the Earth (about 4 light-years away). Name a town, city, or other landmark that is about 48 miles from your home. (Use a mapping app, Google Earth , or a similar program/app to find this.) Apricot, WA 2. Consider the following: ■ The farthest that humans have traveled into space is our Moon, which on your model would be about 1 millimeter away from the Earth. ■ Only two robotic spacecraft, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, have ever traveled beyond the heliopause. These two probes, launched from Earth in 1977, passed the heliopause in 2012 and 2018 respectively, and are the most distant probes that humans have ever sent into space. Given this information, do you think it is likely or unlikely that humans will ever be able to travel to other planets? What about other solar systems? What about robotic probes? Explain. No. I don’t think this is due to technological innovation, nor is it due to a better understanding of the human body and mind and how we are adapting to life on another planet. Planets outside our solar system are too far to reach in a human lifetime with current technology. Robotic probes continue to explore space instead of orbiting Earth. Given that the Moon, which is only about a millimeter from Earth on a model scale, would be the furthest journey of mankind into space, it suggests that there are limits to current technology and our ability to explore space. It’s important to note that technology and space exploration skills are constantly evolving. However, with our current understanding and technology, it can pose difficulties. It is not entirely impossible for humans to travel to other planets in the future. Future advances in space technology and propulsion systems, and a better understanding of long-term space travel, may make interplanetary travel for humans more feasible. 3. Looking out at your model, what do you see mostly? What does most of our Solar System consist of? In my solar system model, I mainly see Earth, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Asteroid Belt, Jupiter, and Saturn. Our solar system is mostly made up of the sun. 4. In this model, you have placed all of the planets in a straight line extending away from the Sun. Is this an accurate representation of our Solar System? Use your knowledge of planetary orbits to explain why or why not. Are there any other ways in which your model fails to accurately represent the Solar System? No, I don’t think this is an accurate representation of the solar system. Because the planets, earth, and sun are all in a straight line, we cannot find out their distance as we would in real life. The way planets are lined up in the solar system do not revolve around the sun in a straight line, but it follows elliptical orbits at different distances from the sun. The way the planets are lined up in a straight line in the model does not take into account the different orbital properties of the planets. Each planet has its own orbit determined by factors such as its distance from the Sun, orbital speed, and gravitational interactions with other celestial bodies.
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