Mars

         Facts about Mars

Mars is sometimes called the red planet because of the brownish-red colour of
its surface. Mars is the second smallest planet in the solar system behind Mercury.
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and last of the terrestrial planets and is around
227,940,000 km from the Sun.

The planet is named after Mars, the Roman god of war. It was known to the ancient
Greeks as Ares, their god of war. This is thought to be because of the red colour of the
planet which was also used by other ancient cultures. Chinese astronomers call Mars
the fire star while ancient called it Her Desher meaning the red one.

The tallest mountain known in the solar system is on Mars. Olympus Mons is a 21 km
high and 600 km diameter shield volcano that was formed billions of years ago.
Scientists have found a lot of recent evidence of volcanic lava which suggests Olympus
Mons may still be active.

It is the second highest mountain in the entire solar system, topped only by the Rheasilvia
central peak on the asteroid Vesta, which is 22 km high. When Mars is closest to the
Sun in its orbit the southern hemisphere points toward the Sun and this causes a very
short but fiercely hot summer.

Mars is the only other planet besides Earth that has polar ice caps. The northern cap
is called the Plenum Boreum, with Plenum Australe in the south. Water ice has also
been found under the Martian ice caps.

Earth

           Facts about Earth

Earth was formed somewhere around 4.54 billion years ago and is currently the only known planet to support lifes. ancient astronomers believed that the Earth was static and had other celestial bodies travelling in circular orbits around it.

They believed this because of the apparent movement on the Sun and planets in relation to their viewpoint. In 1543, Copernicus published his Sun-centered model of the Solar System which put the Sun at the centre of our solar system.

Earth is the only planet not named for a mythological god or goddess. The other seven planets in the solar system were named after Roman gods or goddesses.

For the five visible to the naked eye, Mercury , Venus , Mars , Jupiter and Saturn they all were named during ancient times. This Roman method was also used after the discovery of Uranus and Neptune. The word Earth comes from the Old English word Ertha meaning ground or land.

The gravity between the Earth and the Moon causes the tides on Earth. This effect on the Moon means it is tidally locked to Earth its rotation period is the same as its orbit time so it always presents the same face to Earth.

Venus

                   Facts about Venus

Venus is the second planet from the Sun and the third brightest
object in Earth's sky after the Sun and Moon. It is sometimes
referred to as the sister planet to Earth , because their size and
mass are so similar.

Venus is also the closest planet to Earth. The surface of Venus
is hidden by an opaque layer of clouds which are formed from
sulphuric acid.

The planet is named for Venus, the Roman goddess of love and
beauty and is the second largest terrestrial planet . 243 Earth
days to complete one rotation. The orbit of the planet takes 225
Earth days making a year on Venus shorter on day on Venus.

Also, Venus doesn’t tilt on its axis which means there are no
seasons either. The atmosphere is a dense 96 Percent carbon
dioxide which traps heat and caused the greenhouse effect with
any water sources billions of years ago.

To have a field similar in strength to Earth’s. One possible reason
for this is that Venus has no solid or that its core is not cooling
down. Venus has the highest mountains in our solar system and
is the same size as Earth.

Mercury

        Facts About Mercury  

Mercury is the first planet to the sun. Mercury and Venus have no
moons or rings because they are very small planets. Mercury is
the smallest planet in our solar system and is the second hottest planet.

For every 2 orbit  of the Sun, which takes around 88 Earth days,
Mercury completes three rotations of its axis. It is gravitational
locked and this rotation is unique to the solar system.

Every seven years or so, Mercury can be seen from Earth passing
across the face of the Sun. This happens because Mercury’s orbit
is inclined by 7 degrees to the plane of Earth’s orbit and its known
as a transit.

The next transit of Mercury is on May 9, 2016 and will be visible
from Europe after noon.Mercury is the smallest planet in the solar
system , mercury has wrinkles and also is the closest planet from
the Sun. A day on Mercury takes 176 earth days.

Mercury, actually experiences higher temperatures. This is because
Mercury has no atmosphere to regulate temperature and results in
the most extreme temperature change of all the planets – ranging
from 170 280 during the night to 430 800 during the day.

By : Ngakiri

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