New interesting information about the solar system. Fascinating astronomy: interesting facts about the planets of the solar system

home

Kinds

Astronomy today interests not only schoolchildren. Discoveries that expand our knowledge of space also attract the attention of adults. Interesting facts about the planets are published in popular magazines. And this is not surprising, since the availability of study results increases the number of curious people who want to learn a little more about the vast expanse of the Universe. Below are examples amazing facts associated with the solar system.

Classification

All planets circling in orbit around our star are divided into two types: those belonging to the terrestrial group and gas giants. They differ in composition, size and some other characteristics. Our house, as well as Mercury, Venus and Mars, belong to the terrestrial group. For the most part, the listed planets consist of silicates and metals. The size of these is significantly smaller than the dimensions of the gas giants, as can be seen from the name. The latter include Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The main substances in their composition are hydrogen and helium. Pluto is now deprived of its planetary status and is classified as a Kuiper Belt object - icy witnesses to the formation of the Solar System, located in space beyond Neptune.

Notional surface

When studying information about gas giants, there are Interesting Facts. A lot is known about the giant planets, and every detail is surprising, primarily because it always emphasizes their huge difference from the Earth.

We can start with the fact that on these planets there is no surface in the usual sense for us. The density here is so low that there is no clear distinction between the atmosphere, mantle and core. Scientists determine the surface boundary by the pressure value: it is where the level of one bar is established. In fact, both in this area and below there is a mixture of gases.

Lord of the Seas

Interesting facts about explain why it was given such a name. The color of the cosmic body is rich blue. Beautiful shade is formed due to the properties of methane clouds in the giant’s atmosphere: they absorb red-orange light. Before the final choice of name, several more options were put forward, but through the efforts of one of the discoverers of the planet, Urbain Laverrier, and the director of the Pulkovo Laboratory, N. Ya. Struve, the name of the Roman sea deity was assigned to it.

Neptune, like all gas giants, has satellites. The largest of them, Triton, is no less impressive than the gas giant itself, although it is inferior in size. The satellite rotates in the direction opposite to Neptune's movement around its axis and has an atmosphere. There are supposedly active gas geysers on the surface. On Triton, a significant part of the landscape is formed by ice: methane, ammonia and water. The latter, at the low temperature characteristic of the satellite, becomes hard like stone and forms entire mountain ranges.

frozen planet

Uranus, along with Neptune, is one of the ice giants, since they, like Triton, contain a large number of frozen inclusions. He makes a significant contribution to interesting facts about the planets. Uranus was the first major discovery after the invention of the telescope. As a result of its discovery, the idea that had existed since antiquity was changed. So, interesting facts about the planet Uranus:

First among equals

Interesting facts about the giant planets Saturn and Jupiter are also known in considerable quantities, since they are the best studied among the cosmic giants. Jupiter is 318 times more massive than Earth. Its most famous feature is the large red spot, observed since the mid-17th century. According to scientists, this is a huge anticyclone hurricane. During the entire time it is observed, the spot either fades or becomes brighter again. This happens due to the constant collisions of hurricanes in the atmosphere of Jupiter.

Saturn is famous for its ring system. By the way, every giant has them, but it is Saturn that has the brightest. It also has one more feature - a hexagon formed by clouds in the atmosphere. Presumably, this is a vortex that appears as a result of the difference in the speed of movement of the planet and its rings. However, the nature of education is not fully understood.

Miracles in the earthly group

Interesting facts about planets closer to ours are somewhat different from reports about gas giants due to their different characteristics. At the same time, there are similar moments. For example, Venus, like Uranus, rotates counterclockwise. The sun rises in the west here. But the foggy planet spends more time revolving around its axis: the length of the day exceeds the length of the year. But interesting facts about this do not end there:

Red neighbor

Research into the space closest to Earth is constantly adding interesting facts about the planet Mars. In a sense, they began to study it even before it became possible to send the first spacecraft: several meteorites that arrived from Mars were discovered on Earth. The planet lives up to its name not only by its color, but also by its constant strong forces. They last for several months and cover, like a world war, the entire planet.

Mars is famous and She was called Olympus. It rises above the surface more than 20 km.

Native home

It would be wrong to skip Earth when listing interesting facts about the planets. Its features include not only life and huge water surfaces. This is the only planet whose name does not correspond to any Roman or Greek deity. Its satellite, the Moon, is the largest among all the companions of the terrestrial planets.

Many interesting facts about planet Earth are sometimes unknown even to its inhabitants. For example, a person’s weight depends on his location: it increases in the southern part Pacific Ocean and decreases in southern India. This difference is one of the mysteries of the planet.

Protects life on it from the effects of ultraviolet radiation and solar wind. The gas shell also saves us from the fall of most meteorites: they burn up in upper layers without causing harm. At the same time, about 100 tons of cosmic dust, formed as a result of collisions of asteroids and meteorites, fall onto the surface of the Blue Planet every day.

However, the most amazing phenomenon on Earth is still life. Studying the many facts that scientists have managed to collect about the Universe helps us understand how incredible it is that we exist. Vast expanses of explored space are lifeless; the hope that somewhere far away, perhaps outside the galaxy, there is another civilization is very small. A passionate desire to find life on other planets and a deep sense of loneliness (of humanity in the Universe) are some of the driving forces that motivate astronomers to collect new facts, send spaceships, construct alien conditions in the laboratory.

Astrophysics - comparatively young science. But it was she who began to study interesting facts about the planets solar system, everything about their structure and composition. Having separated from astronomy, she studies physical composition of celestial bodies.

The sky has always been the object of close attention and interest of mankind. The stars have been observed since the time of the mythical Atlantis. The structure of celestial bodies, the trajectories of their movement, the change of seasons on Earth - all this was attributed to the influence of stars. Many theories were confirmed, others were rejected. Over time it was discovered that the Earth not the only planet in our galaxy.

In contact with

List of celestial bodies

Moving on to the description interesting features each, you need to list all the small and large planets of the solar system. A table indicating the position from the sun will be placed just below. Here we will limit ourselves to an alphabetical listing:

Venus;
Earth;
Mars;
Mercury;
Neptune;
Saturn;
Jupiter;
Uranus.

Attention! It is noteworthy that the top three included bodies on which, according to science fiction writers, people will eventually settle. Scientists doubt this option, but everything is subject to science fiction.

Curious facts

Everyone has seen the film “Carnival Night,” so there is no need to retell the plot. But even in terms of New Year's celebrations, which are discussed in the film, there should be a report on the topic: “Is there life on Mars?”

What happened to the lecturer and the report itself is well known to the audience. There is often information about Mars in the news.

Astronomical information also includes the fact that it rotates along the fourth trajectory, if we count from the Sun, belongs to the terrestrial group etc.

Mars

It is interesting that all the names of the nearest planets are named after ancient Roman gods. Mars is the god of war according to ancient mythology. There is a little confusion as many consider him to be a fertility god. Both are right. The Romans considered him the god of fertility, who could both destroy and save the harvest. Then, already in ancient Greek mythology, he received the name Ares (Mars) - the god of war.

Attention! Red Planet - Mars acquired its unofficial name due to the high iron content on its surface, which gives it a reddish tint. God received his formidable name in Greek mythology for the same reason. The reddish tint resembled the color of blood.

Few people know that the first month of spring is named after the god of fertility. It sounds the same in almost any language. Mars - March, Mars – March.

Mars is considered one of the most interesting planets in the solar system for children:

The highest point on Earth three times lower than the highest point on Mars. Mount Everest is over 8 km high. Mount Olympus (Mars) - 27 km.
Due to weaker gravity on Mars you can jump three times higher.
Like Earth, Mars has 4 seasons. Each lasts 6 months, and the entire a year is 687 Earth days(2 earth years -365x2=730).
It has its own Bermuda Triangle. Of every three satellites launched towards it, only one returns. Two disappear.
Moons of Mars (two of them) revolve around it at approximately the same speed towards each other. Because orbital radii are different, they never collide.

Venus

An inexperienced user will immediately answer that the most hot planet solar system, it is the first from the sun - Mercury. However our Earth's twin Venus will easily give him a head start. Mercury has no atmosphere, and although it 44 days heated by the Sun, it spends the same number of days cooling down (A year on Mercury is 88 days). Venus due to the presence of an atmosphere with a high content of carbon dioxide holds high temperature constantly.

Attention! Located between Mercury and Earth, Venus is almost constantly under a “greenhouse” cap. The temperature stays around 462 degrees. For comparison, lead melts at a temperature of 327 degrees.

Facts about Venus:

She has no companions, but itself is so bright that it can cast a shadow.
A day on it lasts more than a year - 243 earth days(year - 225).
3. All planets in the Solar System rotate counterclockwise . Only Venus rotates the other way.
The wind speed on it can reach 360 km/h.

Mercury

Mercury - first planet from the sun. Let's consider interesting information about him:

Despite the dangerous proximity with his hot neighbor, he there are glaciers.
Mercury boasts geysers. Because there is no oxygen on it, they consist of pure hydrogen.
American research satellites detected presence of small magnetic field .
Mercury is eccentric. Its trajectory has an ellipse, the maximum diameter of which is almost twice the minimum.
Mercury is covered in wrinkles and, since it has a minimum atmospheric thickness. As a result the inner core cools down, shrinking. Therefore, his mantle was covered with wrinkles, the height of which could reach hundreds of meters.

Saturn

Saturn, despite the minimal amount of light and heat, not covered by glaciers, since its main components are gases: helium and hydrogen. It is one of the ringed planets in the Solar System. Galileo, who first saw the planet, suggested that the rings were a trace of the movement of two satellites, but they rotate very quickly.

Interesting information:

Shape of Saturn - oblate ball. This is due to the rapid rotation of the celestial body around its axis. Its diameter at the widest part is 120 thousand km, at the narrowest - 108 thousand km.
It ranks second in the solar system in terms of the number of its satellites - 62 pieces. At the same time, there are giants larger than Mercury, and there are very small ones with a diameter of up to 5 km.
The main decoration of the gas giant are its rings.
Saturn 760 times more than Earth .
Its density is second only to water.

Researchers have proposed an interesting interpretation of the last two facts when teaching children:

If you create a bag the size of Saturn, then it would fit exactly 760 balls, the diameter of which is equal to the globe.
If a giant bathtub comparable to its size was filled with water, then Saturn would float on the surface.

Pluto

Pluto is of particular interest.

Until the end of the twentieth century, it was considered the most the farthest planet from the Sun, but due to the discovery of the second asteroid belt beyond Neptune, in which fragments were found weighing and diameter exceeding Pluto, since the beginning of the 21st century it has been relegated to the status of dwarf planets.

An official name to designate bodies of this size has yet to be invented. At the same time, this “shard” has five of its satellites. One of them, Charon, is almost equal in its parameters to Pluto itself.

There is no planet in our system with blue skies, except Earth and... Pluto. In addition, it is noted that there is a lot of ice on Pluto. Unlike Mercury's ice sheets, this ice is frozen water, since the planet is quite far from the main body.

Jupiter

But the most interesting planet- this is Jupiter:

He has rings. Five of them are fragments of meteorites approaching him. Unlike Saturn's rings, they do not contain ice.
The moons of Jupiter were named after the mistresses of the ancient Greek god after whom he was named.
It is the most dangerous for radio and magnetic devices. Its magnetic field can damage the instruments of a ship that tries to approach it.
The speed of Jupiter is also interesting. Days on it are only 10 hours, and year is the time during which it occurs revolution around a star, 12 years.
The mass of Jupiter is several times greater than the weight of all other planets orbiting the Sun.

Earth

Interesting facts.

The South Pole - Antarctica, contains almost 90% of all the ice on the globe. Almost 70% of the world's fresh water is located there.
Longest mountain range is underwater. Its length is more than 600,000 km.
The longest range on land is the Himalayas (over 2500 km),
The Dead Sea is the second deepest point in the world. Its bottom located at 400 meters below ocean level.
Scientists suggest that our celestial body used to have two moons. After a collision with him, the second one crumbled and became an asteroid belt.
Many years ago Earth was not green-blue, as in today's photographs from space, but purple, due to the large number of bacteria.

These are not all the interesting facts about planet Earth. Scientists can tell hundreds of interesting, sometimes funny, pieces of information.

Gravity

The simplest interpretation of this term is attraction.

People walk on a horizontal surface because it attracts. A thrown stone still falls sooner or later - gravity effect. If you are unsure on a bike, you fall - gravity again.

The solar system and gravity are interconnected. Celestial bodies have their own orbits around the star.

Without gravity, there would be no orbits. This entire swarm flying around our star would scatter in different directions.

Attraction is also reflected in the fact that all planets are round in shape. Gravity depends on distance: several pieces of any substance are mutually attracted, resulting in a ball.

Table of length of day and years

It is clear from the table that the further the object is from the main luminary, the shorter the day and the longer the years. Which planet has the shortest year? On Mercury it is only 3 earth months. Scientists have not yet been able to confirm or refute this figure, because not a single earthly telescope can constantly observe it. The proximity of the main luminary will definitely damage the optics. The data was obtained through space research vehicles.

The length of the day also depends on body diameter and the speed of its rotation. The white planets of the Solar System (terrestrial type), the names of which are presented in the first four cells of the table, have a rocky structure and a rather slow speed.

10 interesting facts about the solar system

Our solar system: Planet Uranus

Conclusion

The giant planets located beyond the asteroid belt are mostly gaseous, due to which they rotate faster. Moreover, all four have poles and an equator rotate at different speeds. On the other hand, since they are at a greater distance from the star, their complete orbit takes quite a long time.

All space objects are interesting in their own way, and each of them contains some kind of mystery. Their study is a long and very interesting process, which every year reveals to us new secrets of the Universe.

More than 50 years ago, space exploration began. Following the launch of the first satellite, spacecraft soon went to other planets in the solar system. And although hopes of finding life on other planets have not yet come true, a lot of interesting things have been found on them. Interesting facts about the planets of the solar system are in this post.

The closest and farthest

The closest object in the solar system to Earth is the Moon. The Moon is the only natural satellite of the Earth and is located at a distance of 384 thousand km. As for other planets, due to rotation around the Sun, the distance between them is constantly changing, but Venus periodically turns out to be closest to Earth - at a distance of 38 million km. And the Sun is 150 million km from the Earth.

The planet closest to the Sun in the Solar System is Mercury; it periodically approaches the Sun at a distance of up to 46 million km. The most distant object discovered so far is a dwarf planet under symbol VP113. VP113 has an elongated orbit, with its closest distance from the Sun being approximately 12 billion kilometers and its farthest being more than 66 billion. If Mercury makes a revolution around the Sun in 88 days, then VP113 takes 4270 years!

The most distant of those studied and photographed from close range objects of the solar system are Pluto and its satellite Charon.

The New Horizons spacecraft, which studied Pluto, flew to it for more than 9 years, covering 5 billion km during this time.

Most similar to Earth

It was previously believed that the planet most similar to Earth was Venus. It has almost the same mass and radius (just a little smaller), in addition, Venus is closest to Earth. That's why for a long time scientists hoped that the conditions on Venus would be close to those on Earth, but after the USSR launched the first spacecraft to Venus, it became clear that these hopes were not justified. It turned out that on the surface of Venus there is a monstrous Atmosphere pressure- 90 times higher than on Earth, and the temperature exceeds 460 degrees - Venus is even hotter than Mercury! So in reality, Mars turned out to be most similar to Earth. The average temperature on Mars is -60°C - the same as in Antarctica in winter, but near the equator it can sometimes rise to +20°C. In addition, the inclination of Mars' axis to the orbital plane, as well as the period of revolution around its axis, are also very close to those on Earth. Dry river beds have been found on Mars, and recent studies indicate that liquid water even now exists on the planet.

dry riverbeds on Mars

The most studied planet

Not surprisingly, the most similar climatic conditions Scientists were interested in the planet Earth in the first place. More than 40 spacecraft were launched to study Mars, although not all of them managed to successfully reach the planet (for comparison, only one spacecraft was sent to study Mercury). 4 rovers have already been sent to Mars to explore its surface, and 4 more rovers are planned to be sent in the near future.

Panorama of Mars, compiled from many photos taken by the Curiosity rover:

By switching to full screen mode and rotating the photo with your mouse, you can feel like you're on Mars.

Other records of the Solar system

The most big planet- Jupiter. It is 11 times larger than Earth in size and 318 times larger in mass. However, Jupiter, like the 3 planets following it - Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, is gas giant, and the largest rocky planet in the solar system is the Earth.

The planet with the most large differences surface temperatures is Mercury. The temperature on it ranges from + 430 ºС to sunny side and up to – 180 ºС on the night side.

Venus is the planet that rotates the slowest on its axis. It rotates around its axis in 243 days, and around the Sun in 224 days. That is, one year on Venus is shorter than one day.

Mars has the highest mountains and deepest canyons in the solar system. The height of the Olympus volcano on Mars is 27 kilometers from the base, and the depth of the canyon in the Valles Marineris is 8 kilometers.

Jupiter and Saturn have the largest number of satellites - each of the planets has more than 60 of them, while Mercury and Venus have no satellites at all. In addition, Saturn has rings - the most impressive in the solar system. The rings consist of billions of small fragments, the total width of the rings exceeds 400 thousand km.

Saturn and its rings

In the list of the largest objects in the solar system (including the Sun), the Earth ranks sixth, and the Moon ranks 14th. In total, 17 objects larger than 2 thousand km and 29 objects larger than 1000 km were discovered in the Solar System. and more than 60 - over 500 km in size.

Thanks to space research, new interesting facts about the planets and the solar system are constantly being discovered. We offer a selection of interesting information about our neighbors in space.

The planet closest to the Sun is Mercury. But the farthest planet turned out to be more difficult to determine. Before the discovery of Pluto, it was considered the most distant of them. Subsequently, it turned out that Pluto, due to the large elongation of its orbit at perihelion, approaches the Sun closer than Neptune. And then he was completely deprived of the title of planet. From the moment of its discovery until its demotion from the planets, it did not even manage to make one revolution around the Sun.
In 2006, Pluto was removed from the list of planets. This happened after the discovery of the Kuiper belt beyond the orbit of Neptune, consisting of space objects comparable in size to Pluto. The largest of them are called dwarf planets - Eris, Pluto, Makemake, Haumea.
Astronomers have proposed considering Pluto and Charon a double planet. After all, Charon is only 9 times smaller in mass. And they do not rotate around one another, but around a common center of gravity (pressure center). Some scientists believe that the Sun and the gigantic planet Jupiter form a double star.
The relative positions of the planets are shown by the most large model Solar system, created in Sweden on a scale of 1:20000000 and occupying the entire territory of the country. The sun is depicted in it by the world's largest hemispherical building, Ericsson Globe in Stockholm (diameter 110 m). Mercury is located 2900 m away in the City Museum. Venus - in Royal Polytechnic Institute, Earth - in the museum natural history, Mars - in mall in the suburbs of the Swedish capital. The outer planets are already located far from Stockholm: Jupiter is at the crossroads near Sky City at Arland Airport, Saturn is at Celsius Square in Uppsala, and the patron saint of fishing, Neptune, is in the port of Söderhamn. Uranium will be rebuilt after an act of vandalism. Pluto with Charon - near Lake Dellen. This map of the Solar System also shows asteroids, dwarf planets, and comets. The last facility is planned to be located in the polar city of Kiruna.
Jupiter, consisting of hydrogen and helium, like the Sun, holds the record for mass. It is 2.5 times heavier than all other planets. It’s not for nothing that the science fiction writer A. Azimov uttered the humorous phrase that the solar system is Jupiter plus some debris.
Jupiter has a huge gravitational force. Therefore, it captures space objects flying past. The most famous case is the fall of fragments of comet Shoemaker-Levy in 1994, which was observed by scientists around the world. The picture of this cataclysm inspired filmmakers to create disaster films about the collision of the Earth with a large space object - a comet or an asteroid. But it is thanks to Jupiter that most of the space “junk” does not reach the Earth, ending its path near this giant.
Jupiter has more than 60 moons. Io, Europa, Callisto and Ganymede were discovered by Galileo. Scientists believe that the large moons of Jupiter may become the first objects of space colonization for humanity. In addition, there is liquid water under the ice on Europa, which means life can exist. The presence of water is also assumed at Ganymede and Callisto.
Saturn is famous for its rings. They were discovered by Galileo Galilei, the creator of the first telescope. But later it turned out that the other giant planets also have rings: Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus. It is believed that these are fragments of cosmic bodies captured by the gravitational field of planets and destroyed. But the brightest and most noticeable rings are still those of Saturn.
The rarest planet is Saturn. The density of its substance is 0.687 g/cm³, that is, it is lighter than water.
Neptune - the planet "discovered at the tip of a pen". Mathematicians Adams and Le Verrier, studying the movement of celestial bodies, each independently came to the conclusion that there must be another planet in the solar system. Only its influence could explain the deviations in the movement of other planets. And in 1846, astronomer I. G. Galle discovered an unknown object in the predicted location. Since its discovery, the planet has flown around the Sun only once, which takes about 164 years.
Among the giant planets, Neptune has the highest density. But the force of gravity on it is only 17% greater than on Earth. However, it is impossible to land on its surface, since it consists mainly of gases: hydrogen, helium, methane, etc. Neptune owes its blue color to methane.
The Voyager spacecraft discovered an amazing hexagonal vortex on the planet Saturn that has existed for several decades. Another vortex - Big dark spot- existed until 1994, and the wind speed there reached an incredible value of 2400 km per hour! Previously, only the permanently active Red Spot vortex on Jupiter was known.
Venus has the densest atmosphere, it consists of carbon dioxide . The clouds on it contain compounds of chlorine, sulfur, and sulfuric acid. The temperature on the planet's surface is more than 460°C.
Venus rotates around its axis not like the other planets, but from east to west. Moreover, it turns around its axis in 243 days, and around the Sun - much faster, in 225 days. Uranus also “breaks the rules” by spinning on its side.
The highest mountain in the solar system is Olympus Mons on Mars.. The height of this extinct volcano is more than 21 km.

Questions related to the appearance of man on planet Earth and the emergence of planets in the solar system have always worried, are exciting and will continue to excite the minds of the curious. How did the planets and the Sun appear? What was the impetus for their appearance? Modern science does not stand still, and interesting facts about planets and Space excite humanity, forcing us to ask even more questions.

The Universe and hypotheses about it

The concept of “Universe” includes the energy of space and all visible and invisible bodies.

How and where did the Universe come from? There is no answer, but there are several assumptions (hypotheses) about the reasons for its appearance:

Big Bang. According to this theory, once upon a time there was nothing - all Matter under enormous pressure was compressed into a very small volume. Gradually, the pressure reached critical values and, having heated up to its maximum, the matter began to expand. The explosion occurred 12-15 billion years ago. As a result, clots of energy scattered, and radioactive particles were formed from matter. Those, in turn, gave impetus to the formation of atoms, then various objects of space. The Universe continues to expand and what will happen next? The question remains unanswered.
Big bounce. This assumption is directly opposite to the previous one and assumes that the emergence of the Universe is associated with compression (“rebound”), and not with an explosion. The cosmos is constantly being reborn - it contracts, then expands, and, according to this model, after the expansion that is now occurring, compression must occur. But the theory does not answer how this will happen.
Divine intervention. According to this theory, the Universe could not have appeared without the participation of the Creator - everything was thought out so rationally and logically. The theory is not scientific, but it has a right to exist.

Modern science is looking for confirmation of these hypotheses, but at the moment they remain assumptions, and knowledge about the Solar system is accumulating more and more interesting scientific facts about cosmic bodies, planets, outer space.

Unusual and surprising things about the planets

Outer space is an abyss of mysterious, unknown and interesting things. Rapidly developing, science makes it possible to learn more and more about it.

The planet visible without instruments is located at a great distance from the Earth and is difficult to study, but research is still being carried out, adding new facts to information about it.

Mercury, according to one assumption, was a satellite of Venus, but due to some cataclysm it broke away from its gravity and became an independent planet - the closest to the Sun.

A day on Mercury is 59 days, and a year is 88 days. If we compare this with earthly days and years, we get something difficult to imagine for our earthly time.

Information! From Mercury you can see the movement of the solar disk in reverse side- this is due to the large difference between the speeds of rotation around the axis and movement along the orbit. The planet moves in orbit at the highest speed of all the planets in the solar group, and its orbit is the most elongated.

On Earth we are used to seeing one sunset and one sunrise, but twice, and even three times, it can be seen on Mercury.

It would seem that due to the short distance to the Sun, the planet should have positive temperatures, but the difference between daytime and nighttime indicators is huge - during the day the surface heats up to +430°C, and at night it cools down to -180°C.

Interesting facts about Mercury:

The planet was first mentioned in manuscripts from 3000 BC. e.;
Mercury is only 5,000 km across, and second in density after Earth;
the main element of a small layer of the atmosphere is helium;
the energy received from the Sun is almost 7 times more than the Earth receives;
there were research vehicles in the vicinity of Mercury 2 times;
The Messenger probe has been operating in the orbital space of the planet since 2004;
there is an assumption that the core, weighing 4/5 of the mass of the planet, consists of iron;
there is no change of seasons on the planet.

You can see the bright Venus at sunset, and “ Evening Star"(as it is sometimes called) for only 2 hours. By cosmic standards, it is not far from Earth - only 108,000,000 million kilometers. Its orbit, interestingly, is located inside the earth’s orbit, and the planet moves in the direction opposite to the clockwise direction. Sunrise is therefore observed in the west and not in the east.

Unusual and interesting facts about the planet Venus:

the movement around the axis occurs very slowly and it turns out that the length of the day and the length of the year (243 and 224, 7 earth days, respectively) are almost the same;
the sizes of Venus and Earth are approximately the same;
when moving to Venus, it is possible to establish settlements at an altitude of 100 km from the surface - there the conditions (t°, pressure, gravity) are similar to those on Earth;
for the first time in 1970, a Soviet probe landed on the planet, stayed there for only 23 minutes, but managed to transmit some information, and another device, Venera-13, stayed on the hot surface longer - 127 minutes;
there are no conditions for the existence of any living organisms there - the temperature on the surface is about 470°C, and the pressure is 90 times greater than at the bottom of the earth's sea;
more than 1,600 volcanoes have been discovered on the surface, and many of them are active.

Assumption! After 5 billion years, the Sun will run out of helium and hydrogen, and it will expand and become a red giant, swallowing up nearby planets.

Earth

The Earth is the only cosmic body that has various forms life. Its age is approximately 4,540 million. years. Together with Mercury, Venus and Mars, it is part of the terrestrial group of planets.

There are many interesting facts about our planet and it has been studied more than other cosmic bodies, but people want to know as much as possible about their habitat.

Amazing things about planet Earth:

the speed of the “blue planet” in orbit is 108,000 km/h;
water occupies 71% of the planet's surface and most of it is oceans, but only 5% of them have been explored, but even this small part is home to about 200 thousand marine species;
huge reserves of fresh water (68%) are frozen in glaciers and at the poles;
The Moon is a natural satellite of the Earth, which causes the ebb and flow of the tides and there is an opinion that it was once separated from the Earth as a result of its collision with a cosmic body;
Every year, about 40,000 tons of dust from space falls onto the Earth's surface;
the water column hides many secrets and interesting phenomena - at a depth of 11 km (the Martian trench) there is life, the presence of which was confirmed by researchers (only three people) who visited there;
Most meteorites are found in Antarctica - they are clearly visible on the white surface and more of them fall there.

Unusual fact! In the tropics of Peru there is amazing place– the Shanay-Timpishka River, where the water almost boils, reaching a temperature of 92°C.

Mars

The next planet after Earth, Mars, with two satellites Deimos and Phobos, is located at a distance of 228,000,000 million km from the Sun. It owes its name to the Roman god of war - Mars. The color of the planet, like the color of blood, is red, which is why it is also called the Red Planet. The color is explained by the presence of iron oxides in the layers of the atmosphere.

Interesting facts about Mars are attractive to children, since it is often found in the plots of films and cartoons, in children's works, and the words “Martians” and “Martian” are always heard. The story about the planet Mars can be summarized in the form of brief information about it:

Its age is estimated at 4.5 billion. years;
the size of Mars is significant smaller than Earth– the diameter is 6800 km, which is 2 times less than the Earth’s, the mass is 10% of the mass of the Earth (6.4169x10 23 kg and 5.9722x10 24 kg, respectively), and the volume is such that six planets Mars will fill the volume of one planet Earth;
a revolution around the Sun takes 687 Earth days - this is the length of a year, and the length of a day is 24 hours 40 minutes;
at midday at the equator the temperature rises to +30°C, at night it drops to -80°C, and near the poles to -143°C, and in winter about 20% of the air freezes;
because of big difference temperatures day and night, air movement occurs at high speeds (tornado);
the force of gravity there is less - with a weight of 100 kg on Earth, a person on Mars will weigh only 38 kg, and a high jump will be 3 times higher than on Earth (this interesting fact about the planet has been used more than once in science fiction films);
there is no ozone layer and, therefore, there is no protection from radiation, so radiation doses on the surface of Mars are lethal;
due to the thin atmosphere and low pressure a person can only be there in a spacesuit - without it, oxygen in the blood turns into gas bubbles, and this is fatal;
When approaching the Sun, violent dust storms are frequent on Mars - the wind reaches a speed of 200 km/h, they sometimes last for several weeks, often covering the entire surface of the planet.

Interesting! Spacecraft have been launched to the planet more than once, but only a third of them were able to complete the assigned tasks, and the rest disappeared - apparently, as scientists suggested, there is a Bermuda triangle there, only a Martian one.

Jupiter is a giant planet made of gases. Its dimensions are amazing - the mass is 318 times the mass of the Earth, the volume is 1300 times, the length of the diameter is 10 times. This amazing planet has interesting facts not only for adults, but also for children.

Interesting things about the giant planet:

Jupiter has more satellites than other planets - 79 (an ocean was discovered on Europa, one of the satellites, and there is more water in it than in all earth's oceans and there are probably living organisms there);
10 hours is the time it takes to rotate around its axis, and the planet completes its orbit in 12 years;
the atmosphere is 18 times denser than the Earth’s atmosphere and 89% of its composition is hydrogen, 8-10% is helium, 1-3% is other elements;
giant protects the Earth from large quantity meteorites, attracting them to itself (the power of its magnetic field is greater than that of other planets in the solar system);
For more than 300 years, an atmospheric vortex of enormous size (the Great Red Spot) has been raging and clearly visible from the Earth, its speed is 435 km/h.

Reference! The planet's core is heated to an enormous temperature - 20,000°C.

Saturn is the planet next to Jupiter, named after the patron god agriculture from the ancient Romans. You can see it without instruments. Much data about the planet was obtained using 4 spacecraft that flew to Saturn.

Interesting facts about the planet:

Saturn's density is very low (0.687 g/cm3), so if it happened to be placed in water, it would float on its surface;
seasons change, just like on Earth, but a season lasts 7 years, a year lasts 30 Earth years, the length of a day is 10 hours 32 minutes 35 seconds;
due to the high rotation speed, the planet is significantly flattened at the poles;
near Saturn you can see rings consisting of cosmic dust and ice particles, and about 62 satellites of different sizes (the smallest ones do not have a name).

Unusual fact! Powerful winds on the surface reach speeds of up to 1800 km/h, and hexagonal clouds are sometimes visible through a telescope.

Uranus is a little-studied planet and any interesting fact about it makes you think about the capabilities of the human mind:

this is a giant icy planet with a solid, cold core that is 80% liquid, and an atmosphere made of helium, hydrogen and a small amount of methane, which gives it a greenish color;
atmospheric temperature – -224°С;
the day is short - only 17 hours, but the year is long - 84 earthly years;
the rotation axis is tilted by 98° (according to scientists, the axis tilted as a result of an impact with a cosmic body) and rotation occurs from east to west;
Uranus has 13 rings, believed to be the remains of the moon after it collided with the planet.

Reference! The shell of Uranus, approximately 8,000 km thick, consists of various gases, and the planet has no solid surface.

Neptune is the planet farthest from the Sun, which has many internal satellites rotating within its orbit, and only two external ones. The sea green color is given to it by the methane in the atmosphere.

There are many interesting and surprising facts about the planet. Here are some of them:

a day lasts 16 hours, and Neptune moves in its orbit for 164 years;
temperature indicators in the upper layers of the atmosphere reach – 221.45°C;
there are 5 dark rings consisting of dust particles and pebbles;
The Voyager 2 research vehicle flew past Neptune in 1989 at a distance of 3,000 km.

Proven fact! The wind on Neptune can reach speeds of 2100 km/h.

The interesting facts and stories about the planets given above are only a small part of what science now knows about them. The unexplored depths of space are fraught with many interesting and unusual things.

Sections