Planet Project Research Sites

Use the links under your planet or solar system object to find information to enter into your "Solar System Studies" sheet and to find pictures to use in your presentation. Also, make sure you answer the questions specific to your planet (aka, the "hot topics") which you need for #7 on the worksheet.

MERCURY

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/mercury_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/mercury.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Mercury

Mercury Hot Topics:

1) Significant difference in perihelion and aphelion. How much different? What is the percent difference?

2) How does the length of a day (rotational period) on Mercury compare to the length of a year (orbital period)? What would it be like on Earth if we had a similar day/year cycle? About how many months would the sun be out during one day? How does Mercury’s unusual cycle affect surface temperatures? Use the solarviews website to help with this one.

3) Make sure you talk about the unmanned missions to Mercury, Mariner and MESSENGER. Maybe you could show a couple pictures from MESSENGER in your presentation.

VENUS

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/venus_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/venus.htm data charts, pictures and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Venus click the tabs at the top

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:VenusAnimation.ogg a great animation of Venus rotating that can be downloaded and embedded into keynote

Venus Hot Topics:

1) How does Venus’ atmosphere compare to Earth’s? Gases, pressure, average temperature, etc.

2) There have been several unmanned missions to Venus. One to pay particular attention to would be the Venera missions by the Soviet Union (Russia). They actually landed a robot on the planet and took pictures of the surface. Find some pictures of this and put them in your presentation. What problems did the Venera probes have?

3) What are the two strange thing about Venus’ rotation? One has to do with the rotational direction, one has to do with the day/year cycle.

THE MOON

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/moon_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/moon.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Moon click the tabs at the top

http://space.jaxa.jp/movie/20080411_kaguya_movie01_e.html check out this video taken by a Japanese lunar satellite

1) What causes the phases of the moon?

2) Gotta talk about the Apollo missions, putting man on the moon. Focus on Apollo 11: who went up there, how long was the mission, what did they do, etc.

Here’s one website that has info: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_11/

3) There are some great pictures, videos, and diagrams on Wikipedia.

MARS

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/mars_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/mars.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Mars click the tabs at the top

http://www.universetoday.com/2008/03/22/the-mars-curse-why-have-so-many-missions-failed/

Mars Hot Topics:

1) How does Mars’ atmosphere compare to Earth’s? Gases, pressure, average temperature, etc.

2) What is the “Mars Curse”, the “Mars Triangle”, and the “Galactic Ghoul”? Use the universetoday website.

3) Check out this site: http://www.marssociety.org/portal or look for others that discuss certain people’s desires to send manned missions to Mars and eventually colonize the planet.

CERES AND THE ASTEROID BELT

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/asteroid_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/ceres.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/asteroid.htm

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Asteroids

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Dwarf

Asteroid Belt Hot Topics:

This is a tough topic as there will be no good answers for many of the worksheet’s questions. Find interesting facts about the asteroid belt and focus on the Dwarf planet Ceres in particular.

1) What do scientists believe caused the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter?

2) How much mass does Ceres have compared to the rest of the asteroid belt? How many asteroid belt objects have actually been found? Does the density of the asteroid belt surprise you?

3) Some other cool asteroids to research and find pictures of would be 951 Gaspra, 243 Ida, and 4 Vesta.

JUPITER

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/jupiter_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/jupiter.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Jupiter click the tabs at the top

Jupiter Hot Topics:

1) Some important points: Jupiter’s rings, it’s many moons (don’t focus too much on the 4 big moons, another group is doing that), the Great Red Spot.

2) Jupiter has had a few unmanned missions sent to it. Focus on the Voyager Missions (though, Cassini had some pretty cool flyby pictures) and the upcoming Juno mission.

3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter I know it’s wikipedia, but there are some excellent pictures and videos on this site.

JOVIAN MOONS

The “Jovian Moons” are what we call the moons of Jupiter. In particular, focus on the 4 big ones: Callisto, Europa, Io, and Ganymede. The websites above for Jupiter will help, but here are some more:

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/io.htm Sorry for the annoying ads.

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/callisto.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/europa.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/ganymede.htm

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Jupiter&Display=Moons

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jovian_moons Cool pictures at wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galilean_moons

Jovian Moons Hot Topics:

1) Why are the big ones called the “Galilean Moons”?

2) Scientists are particularly interested in Europa because of a certain chemical that makes up its surface? What is the chemical and why does it interest scientists?

3) Io is volcanic and spacecraft have taken some pretty neat pictures and videos of volcanoes and lava flows. Find some here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Io_%28moon%29

SATURN

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/saturn_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/Saturn.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Saturn click the tabs at the top

Saturn Hot Topics:

1) Obviously, you gotta talk about the rings. Who discovered them, what are they made of, etc.

2) Write some info about Saturn’s many moons. Don’t focus too much on Titan, however, as another group is doing that.

3) Many missions have gone to Saturn, but the one with the best pictures is Cassini, a mission which is still active today. Find some cool pictures on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassini%E2%80%93Huygens

TITAN

Titan is the largest of Saturn’s moons, and the largest moon, period, in the solar system. Use the Saturn links above, as well as these below:

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/titan_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/titan.htm lots of good info and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Sat_Titan

Titan Hot Topics:

1) Titan has been proposed has a possible location for extraterrestrial life and human colonization. What’s up with that?

2) The Cassini space mission has taken the best pictures of Titan. Find some good ones on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_%28moon%29 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassini%E2%80%93Huygens

3) The Huygens probe was dropped from the Cassini Spacecraft and took pictures of the surface of Titan. Here is an article with pictures. http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/feb2005/titn-f14.shtml

URANUS

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/uranus_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/Uranus.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Uranus click the tabs at the top

Uranus Hot Topics:

1) Gotta talk about the rings

2) Uranus had a very strange rotation. What’s up with that?

3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranus I know it’s wikipedia, but there are some excellent pictures and videos on this site.

NEPTUNE

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/neptune_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/Neptune.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Neptune click the tabs at the top

Neptune Hot Topics:

1) What was the “Great Dark Spot”? What Happened to it?

2) Neptune has some rings, though they are very faint. Check out Wikipeda for some good pictures, as well as pictures of Neptune’s largest moon, Triton.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neptune

PLUTO

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/pluto_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/Pluto.htm data charts, pictures, and annoying ads

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Pluto click the tabs at the top

Pluto Hot Topics:

1) Debate about planetary status and the IAU’s 2006 decision

2) It’s moons, in particular, Charon.

ERIS AND THE KUIPER BELT

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/eris.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/kuiper.htm

http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/planetlila/

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Dwarf

http://www.astronomytoday.com/astronomy/eris.html

1) Some other TNOs in the Kuiper belt to research are Haumea and Makemake.

2) How many objects have scientists actually found in the Kuiper belt. How many do they think there are?

3) Wikipedia has some good pictures, as well as an animation of the pictures used to discover Eris. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eris_%28dwarf_planet%29

HALLEY’S COMET AND THE OORT CLOUD

You can really talk about whatever comets you want. Halley’s happens to be the most common as it has been passing Earth periodically for thousands of years, so it might be a good one to focus on for the questions. The Oort cloud is a region beyond the Kuiper belt where many astronomers believe many comets originate.

http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/comet_worldbook.html

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/comet.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/halley.htm

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/oort.htm

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Comets

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=OortCloud

http://www.ianridpath.com/halley/halley1.htm

1) What’s the difference between long-period and short-period comets? Check out the solarsystem.nasa.gov sites.

2) Here are some other comets to talk about and find pictures of: Hale-Bop (I remember standing in my backyard to see this one in 1997, it’s a long-period, so none of us will ever see it again L), Hyakutake, Holmes, The Great Comet of 1882, Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3, and Shoemaker-Levy (which crashed into Jupiter in 1994 and left scars across its surface)

3) Space probe missions to check out: Giotto (got up close and personal with Halley’s comet in 1986) and Deep Impact (got close and even crashed a probe into Tempel 1.

4) Check out great pictures and animations on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet