SPACE AND THE SOLAR SYSTEM

DISCOVER THE EXPANSES OF SPACE AND OUR NEIGHBOURS IN THE SOLAR SYSTEM. YOU WILL FIND OUT ABOUT THE DIFFERENT PLANETS, THEIR UNIQUE FEATURES AND THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF OBJECTS ORBITING THE SUN.

Our Solar System

The scale of the planets can be quite deceiving and many people think that the Earth and Mars are similar in size, but Mars is actually much smaller and Jupiter is much MUCH larger!

Check out the diagram below to find out more about the scale of the planets. Do any of them surprise you?

Image credit: Mercury: NASA // Venus: NASA/ JPL Caltech // Earth: NASA Goddard // Moon: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University // Mars: NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems // Jupiter: NASA, ESA, and J. Nichols (University of Leicester) // Saturn: NASA/JPL // Uranus: NASA/JPL // Neptune: NASA.

The Terrestrial Planets

Source: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

This mosaic of NAC images shows the impact crater Hokusai, located on Mercury at a latitude of 58°N.

Mercury

Mercury’s surface is heavily cratered. The bright spots and pits that you can see litter the planet’s surface making it look similar to the Earth’s moon in many ways.

Craters are formed when an asteroid or comet collides with the planet’s surface.

Mercury’s craters vary in size with some very large impact basins. Caloris basin is 1550 km in diameter!