Celestial Bodies
This term means a natural object found in space.
What is a celestial body?
The object at the center of our solar system.
What is the Sun?
The closest planet to the Sun
What is Mercury?
Planets and moons are visible because they do this with sunlight.
What is reflect light?
The path one object takes around another.
What is an orbit?
These giant balls of hot gas make their own light using fusion.
What are stars?
The force that holds the solar system together.
What is gravity?
The hottest planet due to its thick atmosphere.
What is Venus?
Stars produce light through this process.
What is nuclear fusion?
Most planetary orbits have this shape.
What is an ellipse?
Pluto belongs to this category because it has not cleared its orbital neighborhood.
What is a dwarf planet?
The region between Mars and Jupiter filled with rocky objects.
What is the asteroid belt?
The gas giant with the Great Red Spot and ~97 moons.
What is Jupiter?
This term describes how bright an object is based on how much light it reflects.
What is albedo?
This measures how stretched an orbit is.
What is eccentricity?
A rocky object in space that is smaller than a planet and often found between Mars and Jupiter.
What is an asteroid?
The icy region beyond Neptune where Pluto is found.
What is the Kuiper Belt?
Name two dwarf planets found in the Kuiper Belt.
What is Pluto, Eris, Haumea, or Makemake?
Blue stars are ______ than red stars.
What are hotter?
GPS and weather satellites are examples of this type.
What are artificial satellites?
Name all three stages: space rock, "shooting star" streak, and piece that hits Earth
What are a meteoroid, meteor, and meteorite?
Our solar system is located inside this galaxy.
What is the Milky Way?
Name two differences between terrestrial and Jovian planets.
Small vs huge
Made of rock vs solid core and gas outer layer
Small amounts of moons vs lots of moons
Close to the sun vs farther from the sun
Scientists use reflected light to learn about this on exoplanets (name one).
What is atmosphere, surface, or composition?
Name one way natural satellites help scientists.
What are tides, eclipses, rotation stability, or geology?