Uranus neptune ice giants atmosphere h he and traces

Uranus & Neptune – ice giants; Atmosphere: H, He, and traces of methane, ‣ Methane absorbs red light, giving planets their bluish colors, ‣ Mantles: water, ammonia, and
methane “ices”, ‣ Superheated (2,500 - 5,000º C) and high pressure, ‣ Cores: rock and ices.
What are jovian planets like? ‣ Thick hydrogen, helium atmospheres, ‣ Layered interiors with very high pressure and cores made of rock, metals, and hydrogen compounds
‣ Very high pressure in Jupiter and Saturn can produce metallic hydrogen, ‣ All have strong storms and winds, ‣ What kinds of moons orbit jovian planets? ‣ Moons of many
sizes, ‣ Many major moons show signs of geological activity, ‣ Tidal heating drives activity, ‣ Titan is the only moon with a thick atmosphere, What are Saturn’s rings like?
‣ Made up of countless individual ice particles, ‣ Extremely thin with many gaps, ‣ How do other jovian ring systems compare to Saturn’s? ‣ Much fainter ring systems with
smaller, darker, less numerous particles , ‣ Why do the jovian planets have rings? ‣ Ring particles are probably debris from moons.
‣ A comet has three basic parts: ‣ Nucleus - the dark dirty snowball composed of ices and dirty dust, ‣ Coma - cloud of gas and dust surrounding the nucleus, ‣ Tail - in this case,
both the dust and ion tail.
Nucleus: Mostly water ice, some solid dust; “dirty snowballs”
Coma: When a comet nears the Sun, its ices start to vaporize; jets
of dust and gas erupt from its surface
Produces a cloud around the nucleus called the coma.
Tails: Gas tail - atoms of gases from the comet; Dust tail: smokesized particles (smaller than household dust)
A comet’s tail always points away from the Sun!
Meteoroid: ‣ A bit of interplanetary debris that falls through Earth’s atmosphere
‣ Meteor: ‣ A streak of light caused by a meteoroid, ‣ Commonly called a “shooting star”
‣ Meteorite: ‣ A space rock on the ground
Types of meteorites: ‣ Stonys, ‣ 94% of meteorite falls, ‣ Rocky composition; ‣ Irons, ‣ 5% of meteorite falls, ‣ Iron-nickel alloy; ‣ Stony-Irons, ‣ 1% of meteorite falls
‣ Mixtures of iron-nickel alloy and rocky material
‣ Sun’s energy output = 3.8 x 10^26 Watts
Fission: Big atomic nucleus splits into smaller pieces (like in nuclear power plants); Fusion: Small atomic nuclei combine to make a bigger one (Sun, stars)
The Sun: ‣ The Sun’s size, composition, and temperature, ‣ The Sun generates energy through hydrogen fusion in the core, ‣ That energy first moves through the radiative zone of
the Sun as light, ‣ Then it warms the gas in the convective zone of the Sun and that hot, gas bubbles up to the photosphere, producing granules; ‣ Thermal Radiation, ‣ Hot objects
naturally give off light, ‣ The color of that light depends on the temperature of the object, ‣ The Sun and other stars light comes from this thermal radiation;