Hey there! I’m Erin McCarthy from Mental Floss, and today we’re diving into some amazing facts about our solar system. Did you know that if you took a block of lead to Venus, it would melt like ice on Earth? That’s because Venus is incredibly hot, with surface temperatures around 900 degrees Fahrenheit! Even spacecraft can’t last long there. The Soviet Union’s Venera 13 landed on Venus in 1982 and survived for only two hours, but it still managed to send back the first color images of the planet.
Our solar system is a collection of celestial bodies in the Milky Way galaxy. At its center is the Sun, a star that’s about 4.5 billion years old. Orbiting the Sun are eight planets, over 150 moons, and millions of meteoroids, comets, and asteroids. There are also a few dwarf planets. While our solar system is just one of billions in the Milky Way, it’s the one we know the most about, so let’s explore it!
The Sun is massive, making up more than 99% of the total mass of the solar system. Jupiter, the largest planet, is so big that you could fit all the other planets inside it. In fact, it would take about 1,300 Earths to fill up Jupiter! Jupiter also has a famous storm called the Great Red Spot, which is sometimes larger than Earth. This storm has winds up to 400 miles per hour and heats the atmosphere above it to 2,400 degrees Fahrenheit.
Mercury, like Earth, has tectonic activity. Its surface is changing because the planet has a solid inner core surrounded by a liquid metal outer core that’s cooling. As the liquid parts solidify, Mercury’s surface shifts, making the planet shrink a bit over time.
In 2005, astronomers discovered a dwarf planet named Eris, which led to Pluto being reclassified as a dwarf planet. Eris is similar in size to Pluto, prompting scientists to rethink what qualifies as a planet. Another dwarf planet, Haumea, spins so fast that it looks like a football or a plump cigar!
Space is full of debris, with NASA tracking over 20,000 pieces larger than a softball orbiting Earth. These pieces can travel at speeds over 17,500 miles per hour, posing a threat to spacecraft. Scientists are worried about Kessler Syndrome, where too much debris could lead to more collisions and even more debris. Solutions like using nets to clean up space are being explored.
In 2008, an object named Drac was found orbiting the Sun at a 104-degree tilt, meaning it orbits backward! Drac is in the Kuiper Belt, a region beyond Neptune filled with icy objects, including Pluto. Neptune’s moon Triton, which likely came from the Kuiper Belt, orbits in the opposite direction of Neptune’s rotation and has geysers that erupt.
There’s a fun story about Pluto the dwarf planet and Pluto the Disney dog. While some say the planet was named after the dog, the dog was originally called Rover in a 1930 film and only became Pluto in 1931. Still, it’s a neat coincidence!
Ceres, a dwarf planet, makes up about 25% of the mass of the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It was once considered a planet, then an asteroid, and finally a dwarf planet. Meanwhile, Saturn’s moon Enceladus has a saltwater ocean and complex organic molecules, hinting at the potential for life. Another moon, Titan, also has water and carbon-based chemicals, making it an exciting place for researchers.
Mars is much colder than Earth, with average temperatures around negative 81 degrees Fahrenheit. It hasn’t rained there for millions of years, but Mars is home to Olympus Mons, the tallest volcano known, standing about 16 miles high!
Our solar system has billions of comets, mostly in the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud. Comets are made of ice and rock, and when they get close to the Sun, they develop a tail of gas and dust. In 2014, a probe landed on a comet and discovered it smells like cat urine, rotten eggs, and bitter almonds!
Many of these facts wouldn’t be known without space exploration. The Cassini spacecraft, for example, launched in 1997 and collected data until 2017. It traveled 4.9 billion miles, mostly around Saturn, taking pictures and gathering data. Cassini ended its mission by disintegrating in Saturn’s atmosphere, having done everything asked of it.
Thanks for joining us on this journey through the solar system! If you have any topics you’d like us to cover, let us know. Don’t forget to look up at the stars tonight and appreciate the wonders of space!
Using materials like foam balls, paint, and string, create a 3D model of the solar system. Label each planet and include interesting facts from the article, such as Jupiter’s size or Venus’s temperature. This hands-on activity will help you visualize the scale and composition of our solar system.
Participate in a scavenger hunt where you search for information about different celestial bodies mentioned in the article. Use the internet or library resources to find additional facts about each planet, moon, or dwarf planet. Share your findings with the class to enhance everyone’s understanding.
Engage in a debate about the challenges of space debris and potential solutions. Divide into teams to argue for or against methods like using nets to clean up space. This activity will help you think critically about real-world issues related to space exploration.
Choose a planet or moon from the article and create a weather report for it. Include details like temperature, storms, and any unique weather phenomena, such as the Great Red Spot on Jupiter. Present your report to the class as if you were a meteorologist on that celestial body.
Conduct a simple experiment to simulate a comet’s composition using household items like dry ice, dirt, and water. Observe how the “comet” reacts when exposed to heat, mimicking its behavior near the Sun. This experiment will help you understand the physical properties of comets.
Sure! Here’s a sanitized version of the transcript:
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Hi, I’m Erin McCarthy, editor-in-chief of Mental Floss. Welcome to Mental Floss video! Did you know that if you brought a block of lead to Venus, it would melt like a block of ice on Earth? Of course, you couldn’t bring a block of lead to Venus for many reasons, including the fact that the surface temperature is around 900 degrees Fahrenheit. Even spacecraft sent to Venus can’t withstand the environment for long. The Soviet Union’s Venera 13, for example, landed on Venus in 1982 and lasted about two hours before it ceased functioning. However, the Venera was able to send back the first color images of the planet and analyze its soil, making it a productive visit.
Now, let’s start with an important question: “What is the solar system?” It’s a group of celestial bodies in the Milky Way galaxy. At its center is a 4.5 billion-year-old star, our Sun, which is orbited by eight planets, over 150 moons, and millions of meteoroids, comets, and asteroids, plus a few dwarf planets. While that sounds impressive, it’s just one of tens of billions of solar systems estimated to exist within the Milky Way. We know the most about our own, so that’s what we’ll focus on today.
Our Sun is huge. If you combine the mass of everything in the solar system, the Sun accounts for more than 99% of that mass. Jupiter is massive enough to fit all the other planets inside it; it would take 1,300 Earths to fill up Jupiter. Interestingly, even Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is larger than Earth at times. The Great Red Spot is a storm with winds up to 400 miles per hour that heats the atmosphere above it to 2,400 degrees Fahrenheit, and its size isn’t constant; it’s currently getting taller but smaller in width.
Another interesting planet is Mercury, which, like Earth, experiences tectonic activity. Pictures taken of Mercury indicate that its surface is changing. The planet has a solid inner core surrounded by a liquid metal outer core, which is cooling. Every rocky planet is still cooling from when they initially formed, and as the liquid parts of Mercury’s core solidify, it leads to land shifting and a smaller planet overall.
The dwarf planet Eris, discovered in 2005, was indirectly responsible for Pluto’s reclassification as a dwarf planet. Eris is comparable in size to Pluto, which caused astronomers to reconsider how many newly discovered bodies orbiting the Sun might need to be classified as planets. After Eris’s discovery, the International Astronomical Union established new criteria for planet classification: a celestial body must be round, orbit the Sun, and clear its orbit of smaller objects.
Around the same time Eris was discovered, another dwarf planet, Haumea, was identified. Haumea is unique in that it spins so fast that it has an elongated shape, resembling a football or a plump cigar. It completes a rotation in under four hours.
I often tell people that I will never go to space, and the reason boils down to two words: space debris. NASA knows of over 20,000 pieces of space debris larger than a softball orbiting Earth, out of a total of about 500,000 pieces they track. Each of those pieces is at least as large as a marble, and there are millions of smaller pieces that are impossible to track. Manmade space debris includes non-functional spacecraft, abandoned launch vehicle stages, mission-related debris, and fragmentation debris. This debris can travel at speeds exceeding 17,500 miles per hour, meaning even a small piece can damage operational spacecraft. Sometimes, the International Space Station has to maneuver to avoid space debris.
Beyond the danger to spacecraft, some scientists are concerned about Kessler Syndrome, which occurs when there’s so much debris in low Earth orbit that it collides with itself, creating even more debris. The European Space Agency has proposed cleaning up space debris using nets, while a team at Texas A&M University has suggested sending a mechanism to push objects into Earth’s atmosphere, where they would burn up.
In 2008, an object was discovered that orbits the Sun at about a 104-degree tilt, meaning it is technically orbiting backward. The team that discovered it named it Drac, based on the myth that Dracula could walk up walls. This object was found in the Kuiper Belt, an area of our solar system past Neptune that contains many icy objects, including Pluto. Interestingly, Neptune has a moon called Triton, which is similar to Pluto. Triton likely originated as a Kuiper Belt object that was captured by Neptune’s gravity. Triton has some distinctive features: it orbits Neptune in the opposite direction of the planet’s rotation and has geysers that erupt.
Regarding Pluto, some claim that it was named after the Walt Disney dog that appeared the same year Pluto was discovered in 1930. However, in the 1930 film “The Picnic,” the dog was called Rover and wouldn’t be known as Pluto until 1931. Still, there is a fun coincidence linking Pluto the dog and Pluto the dwarf planet. In 2015, NASA released new photos of Pluto that revealed a light area resembling the dog’s head.
Pluto’s fellow dwarf planet, Ceres, takes up about 25% of the mass of the main asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter. In the 19th century, Ceres was considered a planet, then it was classified as an asteroid, and finally, in 2006, it was upgraded to a dwarf planet. There are millions of asteroids in the same belt as Ceres, ranging from less than 33 feet to 329 miles long. NASA maintains a list of asteroids with the potential to hit Earth in the next century, along with the probabilities of such events.
One of Saturn’s moons, Enceladus, has an entire ocean made of saltwater. In 2018, researchers found complex organic molecules on Enceladus, which could indicate the potential for life. Saturn has another moon with water, Titan, which also contains carbon-based chemicals, another promising sign for life. Any place with both water and carbon-containing chemicals is exciting for researchers interested in finding life beyond Earth.
Mars presents challenges for human visitors as well. Compared to Earth’s average temperature of 57 degrees Fahrenheit, Mars is much colder, averaging around negative 81 degrees. At the poles, temperatures can drop to negative 225 degrees. There has also been no rain on Mars for millions of years, which is tough for Martian landscapes.
However, if we could address the temperature issues, visiting Mars would be worthwhile to see Olympus Mons, the tallest volcano known, estimated to be 16 miles tall—essentially three times the height of Mount Everest. It likely formed around 350 million years ago but last erupted as recently as 2 million years ago.
We have billions of comets in our solar system, primarily in the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud. A comet is made of ice and rock until it approaches the Sun, at which point its exterior turns into a cloud of gas and dust, forming a distinctive tail. In 2014, a probe landed on a comet for the first time, revealing that due to the chemistry of its surface, a comet smells like cat urine, rotten eggs, and bitter almonds.
Finally, many of these facts would still be unknown without the incredible space exploration that has occurred over the years. I can’t cover all the missions, but I want to highlight the Cassini spacecraft, which launched in 1997 and collected data until 2017. Over those twenty years, it traveled 4.9 billion miles and completed 2.5 million commands, spending most of its time around Saturn, taking pictures, gathering data, and analyzing samples. Cassini was sent into Saturn’s atmosphere to disintegrate on September 15, 2017. At a press conference, Cassini’s program manager, Earl Mays, stated, “To the very end, the spacecraft did everything we asked.”
Thank you for watching Mental Floss video, made with the help of many wonderful people. If you have a topic you’d like us to cover, leave it in the comments. Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel, give us a like if you enjoyed the video, and take a moment to appreciate the stars tonight. We’ll see you next time!
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Solar System – The collection of the Sun and all the celestial bodies that are bound by its gravity, including planets, moons, asteroids, and comets. – Our solar system is just one of many in the Milky Way galaxy.
Planets – Large celestial bodies that orbit a star, such as the Sun, and do not produce their own light. – Earth is one of the eight planets in our solar system.
Jupiter – The largest planet in our solar system, known for its Great Red Spot and many moons. – Jupiter is so massive that it could fit all the other planets inside it.
Mercury – The smallest and innermost planet in the solar system, closest to the Sun. – Mercury has a very thin atmosphere, which means it experiences extreme temperature changes.
Dwarf Planets – Celestial bodies that orbit the Sun and are similar to planets but do not clear their orbital path of other debris. – Pluto is one of the most well-known dwarf planets in our solar system.
Asteroids – Small rocky bodies that orbit the Sun, mostly found in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. – Scientists study asteroids to learn more about the early solar system.
Space – The vast, seemingly infinite expanse that exists beyond Earth’s atmosphere, where stars, planets, and other celestial bodies are found. – Astronauts travel to space to conduct experiments and learn more about the universe.
Comets – Celestial objects made of ice, dust, and rocky material that develop a glowing coma and tail when they approach the Sun. – Halley’s Comet is one of the most famous comets, visible from Earth every 76 years.
Mars – The fourth planet from the Sun, known for its red color and the possibility of past or present life. – Mars has the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons.
Exploration – The act of traveling through or studying an area to learn more about it, often used in the context of space exploration. – Space exploration has led to many discoveries about our solar system and beyond.
