Solar System and the Universe
Acceptable answers: Small size, rocky surfaces, warmer than outer planets
The layer of Earth directly below the Earth's crust
What is the mantle?
This is the name for the thin envelope of gases surrounding the planet.
What is the atmosphere?
This is the scale of time used to reference Earth's history
Geologic time or the geologic time scale
This is the name of the model of the solar system as we know it exists, with the planets orbiting a central sun.
What is heliocentric?
Name the four inner planets
Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars
A naturally occurring solid that can form by inorganic processes and has a crystal structure and definite chemical composition.
What is a mineral?
The name for a landform with high elevation and high relief is a _________.
Mountain.
Earth's history (after Precambrian time) is divided into how many eras?
Three (Paleozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic)
This is a unit of measure, where one unit is equal to the distance between Earth and the Sun.
Which property indicates a star's temperature?
Color
Small solid pieces of material that come from rocks or living things
What is sediment?
This kind of water makes up about 97% of the hydrosphere.
What is salt water? (I would also accept 'ocean water')
This is the rule that strata (layers) of newer rock are found above layers of older rock.
The Law of Superposition
This is the name of a small, rocky space object that enters Earth's atmosphere and hits Earth's surface.
What is a meteorite?
Name the end phase of a small or medium mass star
White dwarf (I would also accept black dwarf)
This is the name of the kind of rock that is formed by cooled magma or lava
What is igneous rock?
This is the name for the step in the water cycle that describes the release of water vapor from breathing animals.
What is respiration? (I would also accept Transpiration)
Name one important event from the Cenozoic era
The dominance of mammals, the entirety of human history, an ice age
This is the first stage in the life cycle of a star.
What is a protostar?
An H-R Diagram uses absolute brightness and what other property to classify stars?
Surface temperature
These two forces would need to be applied to igneous rock to transform it into metamorphic rock
What are heat and pressure?
These are the two sources of energy that drive all of the processes in Earth's systems.
What are heat from the Earth's core and energy from the Sun?
Radioactive isotopes are used to determine what
the absolute ages of rocks and fossils
black hole, white dwarf, or neutron star