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Exploring Uranus

Exploring Uranus. By: Evan Greenberg, Paul Szabo , Alex Nagel, and Forrest Montet. Discovery of Uranus. Uranus was initially discovered by William Herschel on March 13, 1781.

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Exploring Uranus

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  1. Exploring Uranus By: Evan Greenberg, Paul Szabo, Alex Nagel, and Forrest Montet

  2. Discovery of Uranus • Uranus was initially discovered by William Herschel on March 13, 1781. • There has only been one fly by of Uranus completed by the NASA Voyager 2 Spacecraft which discovered ocean sized body of water, 10 new moons, and 2 new rings. The fly by also discovered the oddly titled magnetic field that is stronger than Saturn’s.

  3. Rotation and Tilt • Uranus has a tilt degree of 99 which creates an extended period of darkness and light on its northern poles. This time period is 42 years of darkness then 42 years of light. The reason for this is the 99 degree tilt which in turn also effects the planet’s orbit. • For Uranus the rotation of the planet is the opposite of Earth’s, the sun also rises in the south and sets in the north unlike the Earth’s east to west.

  4. Orbital Periods • Uranus has a day period of about 17 Earth hours. • The amount of time for Uranus to circle the sun, also known as its orbital period, is around 84.3 Earth years. • Uranus is 2.88 billion Kilometers from the sun, this is twice as far as Saturn and about 31 times farther than the Earth.

  5. Characteristics of Uranus • It has an average temperature of about -224 degrees Celsius or 49 degrees Kelvin. • It’s generally constructed of a gassy, liquid, and icy atmosphere. The planet itself is also heavily composed of these substances as well. Uranus is a gas giant with no well-defined surface. • Earth’s density is about 5 times that of Uranus, and Uranus’s mass is 14.5 times the mass of Earth.

  6. Atmosphere and Appearance • Uranus’s rings are a very recent discovery, as scientists first observed them by 1977. Saturn was thought to be surrounded by five narrow rings, named Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon, in order of increasing distance from the planet. However scientists have now observed 13 rings around Uranus, named 1986U2R, 6, 5, 4, Alpha, Beta, Eta, Gamma, Delta, Lambda, Epsilon, Nu and Mu. Uranus’s larger rings are surrounded by belts of fine dust. • Uranus has no solid surface, and is a gas giant. Its atmosphere is composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, with a small amount of methane and traces of water and ammonia. Most of the mass of Uranus is contained in an extended liquid core consisting primarily of icy materials like water, methane, and ammonia.

  7. Miranda, the Moon of Uranus

  8. Sources • http://www.space.com/45-uranus-seventh-planet-in-earths-solar-system-was-first-discovered-planet.html • http://www.universetoday.com/44531/uranus-distance-from-the-sun/ • http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/compchart.cfm?Object1=Uranus • http://www.windows2universe.org/uranus/U_comparison.html • http://cseligman.com/text/planets/uranusrot.htm • http://planetfacts.org/temperature-on-uranus-a-cold-cold-planet/ • http://www.space.com/18706-uranus-composition.html • http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/profile.cfm?Sort=Target&Target=Uranus&MCode=Voyager_2

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