In inspiring people to have the passion in understanding the universal laws that govern us all, Professor Stephen Hawking reminds us on his speech for his 70th birthday to “remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet” (enoch, 2012). Many scientists have been “looking up” and have discovered answers to the many questions that we have of the universe for ages. They have constructed theories, launched satellites, observed stellar phenomena, and even sent living beings in space to gain more understanding of the existence of everything. After centuries of research and observation, there are still some aspects of Astronomy that are still to be explored. One of them is the evolution of the Solar System, which is composed of the Sun and everything that travels around it. This includes eight planets and their natural satellites such as the Earth’s moon; dwarf planets such as Pluto and Ceres; asteroids; comets and meteoroids (Solar System Exploration, 2014). The Solar System is located in the Milky Way Galaxy, which is a part of a galactic group under the Virgo Supercluster. Figure 1 shows the location of our Solar System in the Universe. Many theories have been proposed on how the Solar System existed, but none has been completely successful. This spans from the time of the Ancient Greeks to the present 21st Century. As of now, the widely accepted theory is the Nebular Theory, which describes how the Solar System started as a large cloud of gas that contracted under
Gravity: Gravity is a force of nature that keeps things on Earth instead of floating out of the atmosphere.
By the 16th century, astronomers began to note irregularities in the accepted model of the solar system. In the early 1500s, Nicolaus Copernicus noted that the planets had slight discrepancies between their observed and presumed positions. Copernicus thought that the Sun was
The solar system was created 4.6 billion years ago by a gravitational collapse. A solar system is a star that has planets, moons, asteroids, comets, and meteoroids travel around it. The solar system contains eight known planets which are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune. There is around several hundred dwarf plants but only five are currently recognized. The solar system has about 181 moons which orbit around the planets in the solar system. There is also about 150 million asteroids and 3,406 comets also in the solar system.
Understanding of the processes of stellar evolution came as a result of twentieth century advances in both astronomy and atomic physics. Advances in quantum theory and improved models of
however, many crafts like the Hubble, were put in by the space shuttle. The space
When it comes to theories and law’s concerning the movement of stellar bodies and why the universe is moving the way it is and how it came to be, data is continuously being added and revised. It is through this constant revising of theories and establishing of laws that core ideas are proven, with modern day scientists expanding knowledge for the rest of us. One of the earliest pioneers of spatial theories was the Italian astronomer, Galileo Galilei, who used the theories of those who came before and he learned from to paint a better picture of the way the universe was set. True to form, he dealt with accusations of heresy and resistance to his ideas from others during his life, which today are held as being before his time.
Although all nine planets are a huge part of the solar system there's a lot more to the solar system than the nine planets. According to scientist the Solar System started out as an enormous cloud of gas and dust. Scientist believe that the cloud of dust and gas began to collapse under the weight of its own gravity and it did. The matter that was kept within itself began moving in a giant circle and at the center of the spinning cloud a tiny star began to form. The star eventually grew larger and collected more dust and gas that collapsed into it. Farther from the center of the mass that was being formed there was many smaller clumps of dust and gas that were also collapsing. The large cloud in the center eventually became the sun while the smaller clumps formed the planets, moons, comets and,
In this paper I will explain how astronomers determine the composition, temperature, speed, and rotation rate of distant objects using various methods. I will explain the properties of stars. I will also summarize the complete lifecycle of the Sun and determine where the Sun is currently in its lifecycle.
Throughout the second chapter of Investigating Astronomy: A Conceptual View of the Universe, authors Timothy Slater and Roger
The life cycle of the star is a long process that has taken place for billions of years and will continue to take place long after our star is no longer in existence. In this essay I will be explaining the magnificent process of how a star is first born till the end of its life cycle. First, I will be explaining how the star is first formed in all its beauty big or small. Then, I will be explaining the path of an average star like our own sun will take. After, I will be explaining the journey of a massive star in all its glory till its destructive end. All stars are first formed in clouds of gas called nebulae, turbulence deep within the nebulae causes cores to form as the mass begins to grow the nebulae begins to collapse upon itself due to
Several unresolved problems remain concerning the Orion Nebula. The fate of the protoplanetary disks, for example, is presently impossible to predict. Without a more detailed understanding of how planets actually form, it cannot be assumed that the events within the Orion Nebula are analogous to the events that led to the formation of the planets in the solar system. Furthermore, the detection of water in the nebula has revealed the need to revise the theory of star formation to
In the 16th Century a Polish astronomer, Copernicus ,made a model that placed the Sun in the centre of the Solar System. Before then, astronomers had very complicated models which tried to explain the movement of the planets. They were said to move forwards then backwards. Astronomers had a theory that the planets were spheres in spheres which could explain the movement of the planets. Although Copernicus simplified it all and showed that the Earth was orbiting the Sun and the weird motions of the planets was easier to understand as the Earth caught up to them then passed them in orbit
Scientists have been researching about outer space for years but still don’t know as much as one may think. Scientists still do not know much about the early solar system. Scientists believed that the solar system was reshuffled around in the past which would explain the Kuiper belt and the Oort cloud of icy bodies, the inner planets being destroyed by asteroids and why there isn’t any super Earths around in this solar system. But scientists recently discovered something that may change their theory. In Michael D. Lemonick’s “Plant Nine from Outer Space,” Lemonick claims that scientists may have found a planet with ten times the mass of Earth that is beyond Pluto and may be the reason why objects from the Kuiper belt are following similar orbits
Humans live on a small planet in a tiny part of a vast universe. This part of the universe is called the solar system, and is dominated by a single brilliant star-the sun. The solar system is the earth’s neighbourhood and the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto are the Earth’s neighbours. They all have the same stars in the sky and orbit the same sun.
In 1609, Galileo Galilei, using “spyglass” which allowed one to see things closer than they appeared, made an early version of the telescope. With it, he observed the skies in a way no one had before. He discovered the moon isn’t perfectly globular, it has craters, the Sun has sunspots, Venus orbits the Sun (contrary to widespread belief in his time), and then he observed four “stars” around Jupiter (“Our Solar System”). Within