Solar System B

[gyourkoshaven]

I'm confused about uranus
how do we know which pole is north or south?

Uranus's south pole was pointed almost directly at the Sun at the time of Voyager 2's flyby in 1986. The labeling of this pole as "south" uses the definition currently encouraged by the International Astronomical Union, namely that the north pole of a planet or satellite should be the pole which points above the invariable plane of the solar system, regardless of the direction the planet is spinning. However, a different convention is sometimes used, in which a planet's north and south poles are defined according to the right-hand rule in relation to the direction of rotation. In terms of this coordinate system it was Uranus's north pole which was in sunlight in 1986.

But I think the north is facing the sun now, since they had an equinox in December 2007.

[waawamellon]

Pluto is a planitoid??

[smiley25d]

Pluto is a planitoid??

its a dwarf planet

[gyourkoshaven]

Planetoids (Mainly known as asteroids or minor planets) are small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun, especially in the inner Solar System; they are smaller than planets but larger than meteoroids. The term asteroid has historically been applied primarily to minor planets of the inner Solar System, as the outer Solar System was poorly known when it came into common usage. The difference between asteroids and comets is made on visual appearance: Comets show a perceptible coma while asteroids do not.

While a dwarf planet is a celestial body orbiting the Sun that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, but has not cleared its neighboring region of planetesimals and is not a satellite. More explicitly, it has to have sufficient mass to overcome its compressive strength and achieve hydrostatic equilibrium. It should not be confused with a minor planet. The five dwarf planets in the Solar System are Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, and Eris

[waawamellon]

Can we have a whole page of notes, a binder, or what? Because there's lot of stuff to remember...

[brobo]

you can bring in one 11x8.5 sheet of plain boring printer paper, front and back. you can put anything onto that paper, in any font.
too bad you can't bring in a magnifing glass... we might need one to read our notes...

[amerikestrel]

What exactly is this event focused on? I'm trying to decide if I should do it this year.

[brobo]

Wow, your school hasn't decided on events yet?

Its basically about everything in our solar system, like the kuiper belt or oort cloud. Also know the properties of the sun, planets, and major moons, and some common knowledge like Kepler's laws and how to calculate the Escape Velocity of a planet.

[AlphaTauri]

My school hasn't decided either. We haven't even formed our team yet, but that's ok because our regionals and states are absurdly late.

Anyways, add this to the list of stuff to study:

• ~Newtons Laws of Motion and Gravitational Attraction
  ~The history of the Solar System
  ~The Sun
  ~Asteroids, comets, meteorites
  ~Earth's seasons, eclipses, and tides
  ~Planetary motions (rotation, revolution, that kind of thing)
  ~Effects of planets and their moons on each other

[EastStroudsburg13]

Wow, your school hasn't decided on events yet?

Neither has ours, and we're far from doing so. As of now only 4 people have attended our only meeting, although we're recruiting people, and we haven't gotten the regionals schedule yet, so nothing can be permanent. From what I'm guessing, there are a lot of schools that haven't really started seriously meeting, much less have the events set already.

In response to the question, you should also know the difference between a planet and a dwarf planet, and the characteristics of the dwarves and their moons.