A Census of the Solar System

1 star and 8 major planets

Mercury

Venus

Earth

Mars

Jupiter

Saturn

Uranus

Neptune

terrestrial

giant

(1)

(2)

(17)

(18)

(21)

(8)

Planetary comparisons The Gas Giants

Jupiter -- 1/1000 Msun , 300 Mearth

1/10 Rsun , 11 Rearth

Terrestrial Objects

7 largest moons

Other members Dwarf Planets – Pluto and the Trans-Neptunian or Kuiper Belt Objects

Highly elliptical orbit inclined 170 to ecliptic

Brings it inside Neptune’s orbit, 1979 – 1999, Pluto was closer than Neptune

Asteroids, Meteors and Comets

Formation of Solar System

The Condensation Sequence of the elements, minerals and molecules

The Heavy Bombardment

Astrometric Detection Method

Doppler Detection Method

Transit Detection Method

The first two methods are based on the fact that a planet orbiting a star will cause the star to "wobble" in space.

The first method detects the component of this wobble that is horizontal to our line of site, and is based simply on observing the position of the star over time.

The Search for ExoSolar Planets

***The second method detects the component of the wobble that is radial to us, (i.e. directly towards or away from us), and is based on the Doppler shift in the star's light as the star moves towards or away from us.

*** The third method is based on detecting the small drop in apparent luminosity of a star as a planet transits in front of it, between the star and the Earth.

ExtraSolar System Planets

Multiple systems

As of 1 Feb, 2011 -- 519 planets confirmed

A NASA telescope taking a nose count of planets in one small neighborhood of the Milky Way registered more than 1,200 candidates, including 58 residing in life-friendly orbits around their parent stars.

The census, collected by NASA's Kepler Space Telescope after just four months of work, shows that small planets like Earth are much more prevalent than Jupiter-sized worlds and that multiple-planet systems are common (about 200).

Results from Kepler satellite:

Press release Feb 2, 2011