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Solar System Leftovers

Solar System Leftovers. Solar System Astronomy Chapter 12. Solar System Leftovers. …really asteroids, meteorites, comets, and other debris… …still Chapter 12. Debris. Asteroids small, irregular bodies most are rock or metal most orbit between Mars and Jupiter

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Solar System Leftovers

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  1. Solar System Leftovers Solar System Astronomy Chapter 12

  2. Solar System Leftovers …really asteroids, meteorites, comets, and other debris… …still Chapter 12

  3. Debris • Asteroids • small, irregular bodies • most are rock or metal • most orbit between Mars and Jupiter • some can cross Earth’s orbit • model conditions in the early Solar System (?)

  4. Debris • Meteorites • pieces of asteroids that have fallen to Earth • In space it is called a meteoroid • While passing through the atmosphere, it is a meteor • If it hits, it is a meteorite • Different types: • reflect different physical conditions during formation

  5. Debris • Meteorites • Different types: • Stony • Like Earth rocks • Come are carbonaceous • Iron • High concentrations of metals • Stony-iron • Can date meteorites to age of Solar System • HOW?

  6. Debris • Meteorites • from microscopic dust to a few centimeters • About 2 meteorites large enough to produce visible impacts strike the Earth every day • Statistically, one meteorite is expected to strike a building somewhere on Earth every 16 months • typically impact atmosphere 10-30 km/s • ~30 times faster than a rifle bullet

  7. Primitive or Processed? • Larger asteroids & planets were hot/molten during formation • Leads to differentiation • Heavy minerals sink • Some asteroids were part of differentiated bodies • So asteroids collide & fragment

  8. Asteroids • Orbits • Most between Mars & Jupiter • Orbits are prograde • Orbits are not highly inclined from plane of Solar System • Orbits are not highly eccentric (circular or nearly so) • Though many NEAs have orbits crossing Earth’s

  9. Asteroids • Orbits

  10. Asteroids • Orbits

  11. Asteroids • Orbits • Kirkwood Gaps

  12. Asteroids • Orbits

  13. Asteroids • Orbits

  14. Beyond the Asteroid Belt

  15. Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNO)

  16. Comets • Big, dirty snowballs • Nucleus is ice/rock mix • ~5 km • Active near Sun • Nucleus • Coma • Ion tail • Dust tail • Comet tails point away from Sun

  17. Comets • Big, dirty snowballs • Nucleus is ice/rock mix • ~5 km • Active near Sun • Nucleus • Coma • Ion tail • Dust tail • Comet tails point away from Sun

  18. Comets • Big, dirty snowballs • Nucleus is ice/rock mix • ~5 km • Active near Sun • Nucleus • Coma • Ion tail • Dust tail • Comet tails point away from Sun

  19. Comets • Big, dirty snowballs • Nucleus is ice/rock mix • ~5 km • Active near Sun • Nucleus • Coma • Ion tail • Dust tail • Comet tails point away from Sun Comet Hale-Bopp, 1997

  20. Comets • fragmentation Shoemaker-Levy 9 Callisto Moon

  21. Comets • Geology • Comet nuclei contain ices of water, carbon dioxide, methane, ammonia, etc • these should have condensed from outer solar nebula • those compounds sublime (transition from solid directly to gas phase) as comets approach sun • Densities of comet nuclei: ~0.1–0.25 g/cm3 • not solid ice balls — fluffy material, significant amounts of empty space

  22. Comets • Origins • Most believed from Oort Cloud • 10-100k AU • Some from Kuiper Belt • 30-50 AU Comet Hale-Bopp, 1997

  23. Impacts

  24. Impacts • Chixulub

  25. Impacts • Chixulub

  26. Impacts • Chixulub • Mayan for “tail of the devil” • now buried beneath a kilometer-thick sequence of sediments • diameter of 145 to 180 km • object that hit ~10 km diameter • impact ~6 million times more energetic than 1980 Mt St Helens • impact ejected rock from several km beneath the surface of the Earth

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