Solar System, the Sun and the celestial bodies orbiting the Sun, including the nine planets and their satellites; the asteroids and comets; and interplanetary dust and gas. The term may also refer to a group of celestial bodies orbiting another star. Solar system refers to the system that includes Earth and the Sun. The dimensions of the solar system are specified in terms of the mean distance from Earth to the Sun, called the astronomical unit (AU). One AU is 150 million km (about 93 million miles). The most distant known planet, Pluto, orbits about 39 AU from the Sun. The boundary between the solar system and interstellar space—called the heliopause—is estimated to occur near 100 AU. Comets, however, achieve the greatest distance from the Sun; they have highly eccentric orbits ranging out to 50,000 AU or more.
The solar system was the only planetary system known to exist around a star similar to the Sun until 1995. Since then, astronomers have found planets and disks of dust in the process of forming planets around many other stars. Most astronomers think it likely that solar systems of some sort are numerous throughout the universe.
The Sun and the Solar Wind
The Sun is a typical star of intermediate size and luminosity. Sunlight and other radiation are produced by the conversion of hydrogen into helium in the Sun’s hot.
For all the Sun’s steadiness, it is an extremely active star. On its surface, dark sunspots bounded by intense magnetic fields come and go in 11-year cycles and sudden bursts of charged particles from solar flares can cause auroras and disturb radio signals on Earth. A continuous stream of protons, electrons, and ions also leaves the Sun and moves out through the solar system. This solar wind shapes the ion tails of comets and leaves its traces in the lunar soil.
The Major Planets
Nine major planets are currently known. They are commonly divided into two groups: the inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars) and the outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune). The inner planets are small and are composed primarily of rock and iron. The outer planets are much larger and consist mainly of hydrogen, helium, and ice. Pluto does not belong to either group, and there is an ongoing debate as to whether Pluto should be categorized as a major planet.
Mercury is surprisingly dense, apparently because it has an unusually large iron core. With only a transient atmosphere, Mercury has a surface that still bears the record of bombardment by asteroidal bodies early in its history. Venus has a carbon dioxide atmosphere 90 times thicker than that of Earth, causing an efficient greenhouse effect by which the Venusian atmosphere is heated. The resulting surface temperature is the hottest of any planet—about 477°C (about 890°F). Earth is the only planet with abundant liquid water and known life. Strong evidence exists that Mars once had liquid water on its surface, but now its carbon dioxide atmosphere is so thin that the planet is dry and cold, with polar caps of frozen water and solid carbon dioxide, or dry ice.
Jupiter is the largest of the planets. Its hydrogen and helium atmosphere contains pastel-colored clouds, and its immense magnetosphere rings, and satellites make it a planetary system unto itself.
At least four of Jupiter’s moons have atmospheres, and at least three show evidence that they contain liquid or partially-frozen water. Saturn rivals Jupiter, with a much more intricate ring structure and a similar number of satellites.
Uranus and Neptune are deficient in hydrogen compared with Jupiter and Saturn; Uranus, also ringed, has the distinction of rotating at 98° to the plane of its orbit. Pluto seems similar to the larger, icy satellites of Jupiter or Saturn. Pluto is so distant from the Sun and so cold that methane freezes on its surface.
Movements of the Planets and Their Satellites
If one could look down on the solar system from far above the North Pole of Earth, the planets would appear to move around the Sun in a counterclockwise direction. All of the planets except Venus and Uranus rotate on their axes in this same direction. The entire system is remarkably flat—only Mercury and Pluto have obviously inclined orbits. Pluto’s orbit is so elliptical that it is sometimes closer than Neptune to the Sun.
The satellite systems mimic the behavior of their parent planets and move in a counterclockwise direction, but many exceptions are found. Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune each have at least one satellite that moves around the planet in a retrograde orbit (clockwise instead of counterclockwise), and several satellite orbits are highly elliptical. Jupiter, moreover, has trapped two cluلم sters of asteroids (the so-called Trojan asteroids) leading and following the planet by 60° in its orbit around the Sun. (Some satellites of Saturn have done the same with smaller bodies.) The comets exhibit a roughly spherical distribution of orbits around the Sun.
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