A) a trans-Mercurian close to the sun?

planet Your Answer: No answer given

1) Mercury is named after B) a Venusian satellite Correct Answer: The ice begins to
the Roman God of: C) solar flares melt, leaving a trail of gases and
A) Medicine D) morning and
debris.
B) Trade evening stars
C) Racers
D) Heat 4) What did 17th-century
8) Mercury has
astronomer Edmund Halley notice
A) volcanic activity
2) The greatest temperature about the comet later named after
B) a mostly molten
on Mercury is near core him?
A) 400 K C) tectonic activity Your Answer: No answer given
B) 600 K D) great continental Correct Answer: The comet passed
C) 700 K plates by the Earth on a predictable
D) 900 K schedule.
9) Mercury's magnetic field 5) What is a meteorite?
3) Which Mariner probe was discovered by Your Answer: No answer given
visited Mercury? A) an amateur Correct Answer: a chunk of comet
A) Mariner 10 astronomer (rock) that survives our
B) Mariner 8 B) an observatory
atmosphere and falls to Earth
C) Mariner 6 C) the Hubble Space
D) Mariner 5 6) What is the central and largest
Telescope
D) a space probe body of our solar system?
4) Mercury's greatest land Your Answer: No answer given
feature is termed Correct Answer: the sun
10) Mercury has the oddity
A) the Regolith of 7) The fates of the sun and the
B) Olympus Mons A) a day longer than a Earth are linked. Which of the
C) the Caloris Basin year following explains why this
D) The Ascalon Rift B) a perpetual dark side statement is true?
C) rivers of molten tin Your Answer: No answer given
5) Water is suspected D) five phases Correct Answer: Without the heat
around Solar System Knowledge Quiz and light from the sun, life on
A) the South Pole Earth will cease.
B) the North Pole 1) The sun is 8) Planets have elliptical orbits.
C) the dark side
Your Answer: No answer given This means that
D) the Ascalon Rift
Correct Answer: just one of Your Answer: No answer given
billions of stars that make up our Correct Answer: at some point of
6) Mercury's magnetosphere
galaxy. its orbit, a planet is closer to the
is generated by its
A) core 2) Which of these features makes sun.
B) sub-surface iron the Earth unique among planets? 9) We have a 24-hour day because
deposits Your Answer: No answer given that is
C) proximity to the sun Correct Answer: It is the only Your Answer: No answer given
D) solar-wind planet that has enough oxygen in Correct Answer: the length of time
"umbrella" its atmosphere to sustain life. it takes the Earth to rotate once
3) Comets are icy masses of frozen around its axis.
7) Mercury was originally gases and dust particles. What 10) On Earth one year is
believed to be happens when a comet gets too Your Answer: No answer given
Correct Answer: the length of time
for the Earth to travel once around
the sun.
1.How many moons exist for all
the planets combined in our solar
system?
Correct Answer: 137
2. The Sun has a core temperature
of approximately:
Correct Answer: 27,000,000
degress F
3. Nicolas Copernicus was
responsible the then controversial
theory that:
Correct Answer: Planets revolve
around the Sun.
4. Which planet has the Dark
Spot?
Correct Answer: Neptune
5. how many moons does earth
have
Correct Answer: 1
6. what is the diameter of the
planet Saturn?
Correct Answer: 120,500
7. what is nuclear fusion?
Correct Answer: when hydrogen
atoms collide to form helium
8. Which is the nearest star to the
Earth other than the sun?
Correct Answer: alpha centauri
9. In which planet or star the
"great red spot" is there?
Correct Answer: jupiter
10. what is the venus surface
temperture?
Correct Answer: 700K
11. What planet is closet to the
sun?
Correct Answer: Mercury
12. How many stars in galaxy?
Correct Answer: countless

Venus is the second planet from the Sun and the sixth largest. Venus' orbit is the most nearly circular of that
of any planet, with an eccentricity of less than 1%.

orbit: 108,200,000 km (0.72 AU) from Sun

diameter: 12,103.6 km
mass: 4.869e24 kg

Venus (Greek: Aphrodite; Babylonian: Ishtar) is the goddess of love and beauty. The planet is so named
probably because it is the brightest of the planets known to the ancients. (With a few exceptions, the surface
features on Venus are named for female figures.)

Venus has been known since prehistoric times. It is the brightest object in the sky except for the Sun and the
Moon. Like Mercury, it was popularly thought to be two separate bodies: Eosphorus as the morning star and
Hesperus as the evening star, but the Greek astronomers knew better. (Venus's apparition as the morning star is
also sometimes called Lucifer.)

Since Venus is an inferior planet, it shows phases when viewed with a telescope from the perspective of
Earth. Galileo's observation of this phenomenon was important evidence in favor of Copernicus's heliocentric
theory of the solar system.

The first spacecraft to visit Venus was Mariner 2 in 1962. It was subsequently visited by many others (more
than 20 in all so far), including Pioneer Venus and the Soviet Venera 7 the first spacecraft to land on another
planet, and Venera 9 which returned the first photographs of the surface. The first orbiter, the US spacecraft
Magellan
produced detailed maps of Venus' surface using radar. ESA's Venus Express is now in orbit with a large variety
of instruments.
 Venus' rotation is somewhat unusual in that it is both very slow (243 Earth days per Venus day, slightly
longer than Venus' year) and retrograde. In addition, the periods of Venus' rotation and of its orbit are
synchronized such that it always presents the same face toward Earth when the two planets are at their closest
approach. Whether this is a resonance effect or merely a coincidence is not known.

Venus is sometimes regarded as Earth's sister planet. In some ways they are very similar:

 Venus is only slightly smaller than Earth (95% of Earth's diameter, 80% of Earth's mass).
 Both have few craters indicating relatively young surfaces.
 Their densities and chemical compositions are similar.

Because of these similarities, it was thought that below its dense clouds Venus might be very Earthlike and
might even have life. But, unfortunately, more detailed study of Venus reveals that in many important ways it is
radically different from Earth. It may be the least hospitable place for life in the solar system.
Venus in visible light from Galileo
The pressure of Venus' atmosphere at the surface is 90 atmospheres (about the same as the pressure at a depth of
1 km in Earth's oceans). It is composed mostly of carbon dioxide. There are several layers of clouds many
kilometers thick composed of sulfuric acid. These clouds completely obscure our view of the surface. This
dense atmosphere produces a run-away greenhouse effect that raises Venus' surface temperature by about 400
degrees to over 740 K (hot enough to melt lead). Venus' surface is actually hotter than Mercury's despite being
nearly twice as far from the Sun.
There are strong (350 kph) winds at the cloud tops but winds at the surface are very slow, no more than a few
kilometers per hour.

Venus probably once had large amounts of water like Earth but it all boiled away. Venus is now quite dry.
Earth would have suffered the same fate had it been just a little closer to the Sun. We may learn a lot about
Earth by learning why the basically similar Venus turned out so differently.

Most of Venus' surface consists of gently rolling plains with little relief. There are also several broad
depressions: Atalanta Planitia, Guinevere Planitia, Lavinia Planitia. There two large highland areas: Ishtar
Terra in the northern hemisphere (about the size of Australia) and Aphrodite Terra along the equator (about
the size of South America). The interior of Ishtar consists mainly of a high plateau, Lakshmi Planum, which is
surrounded by the highest mountains on Venus including the enormous Maxwell Montes.

Data from Magellan's imaging radar shows that much of the surface of Venus is covered by lava flows. There
are several large shield volcanoes (similar to Hawaii or Olympus Mons) such as Sif Mons. Recently announced
findings indicate that Venus is still volcanically active, but only in a few hot spots; for the most part it has been
geologically rather quiet for the past few hundred million years.

There are no small craters on Venus. It seems that small meteoroids burn up in Venus' dense atmosphere
before reaching the surface. Craters on Venus seem to come in bunches indicating that large meteoroids that do
reach the surface usually break up in the atmosphere.

The oldest terrains on Venus seem to be about 800 million years old. Extensive volcanism at that time wiped
out the earlier surface including any large craters from early in Venus' history.

Magellan's images show a wide variety of interesting and unique features including pancake volcanoes (left)
which seem to be eruptions of very thick lava and coronae (right) which seem to be collapsed domes over large
magma chambers.
 The interior of Venus is probably very similar to that of Earth: an iron core about 3000 km in radius, a molten
rocky mantle comprising the majority of the planet. Recent results from the Magellan gravity data indicate that
Venus' crust is stronger and thicker than had previously been assumed. Like Earth, convection in the mantle
produces stress on the surface. However on Venus the stress is relieved in many relatively small regions instead
of being concentrated at the boundaries of large plates as is the case on Earth.

Venus has no magnetic field, perhaps because of its slow rotation.

Venus is usually visible with the unaided eye. Sometimes (inaccurately) referred to as the "morning star" or
the "evening star", it is by far the brightest "star" in the sky. There are several Web sites that show the current
position of Venus (and the other planets) in the sky. More detailed and customized charts can be created with a
planetarium program.

On June 8 2004, Venus passed directly between the Earth and the Sun, appearing as a large black dot
travelling across the Sun's disk. This event is known as a "transit of Venus" and is very rare: the last one was in
1882, the next one is in 2012 but after than you'll have to wait until 2117. While no longer of great scientific
importance as it was in the past, this event was the impetus for a major journey for many amateur astronomers.

0.728 231 28 AU
Venus  
107,476,259 km
Perihelion
0.718 432 70 AU

108,208,930 km
Semi-major axis
0.723 332 AU

Eccentricity 0.006 8

224.700 69 day
Orbital period 0.615 197 0 yr
1.92 Venus solar day

Synodic period 583.92 days[1]

Venus in real color
Average orbital speed 35.02 km/s
Designations
Mean anomaly 50.44675°
Pronunciation i
/ˈviːnəs/
3.394 71° to Ecliptic
Venusian or (rarely) Inclination 3.86° to Sun’s equator
Adjective 2.19° to Invariable plane[2]
Cytherean, Venerean

Longitude of
Orbital characteristics 76.670 69°
ascending node

Epoch J2000
Argument of
54.852 29°
perihelion
Aphelion 108,942,109 km
 Satellites None Flattening 0[3]

4.60×108 km2
Physical characteristics Surface area 0.902 Earths

6,051.8 ± 1.0 km[3]

Mean radius
0.949 9 Earths