Jun 15

Comets - The Ugly Ducklings of a Young Solar System

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Hans Christian Andersen (1807-1875) wrote a fascinating tale about a swan that was born on a farmyard and thought it was a duck. The other ducks despised this ugly brown bird and chased it away.

One day, however, Ugly Duckling saw some big white birds swimming in a pond. It expected them to drive it out, but they did not. Then the bird looked into the water and saw the reflection of itself: it was not a duckling after all but a beautiful white bird like the others, a swan.

Most of the time comets are like Ugly Duckling. The comet’s nucleus is a small dirty rock usually 1-10 kilometers in diameter consisting of ice, gas and dust. In some comets, this nucleus is surrounded by a huge hydrogen cloud, which may be up to 3 million kilometers wide.

As the comet comes near the sun, a dramatic metamorphosis seems to take place: According to NASA’s comet website, the sun’s heat “vaporizes some of the icy nucleus or head and sunlight reflects from the vapor. Solar wind pushes the vapor in a direction away from the Sun to form the comet’s tail. For this reason, comet tails generally point away from the Sun.”

Comets can be roughly divided into two categories: long-term comets, which orbit the sun in more than 200 years, and short-term comets, with an orbital period of 200 years or less. Some of them are so spectacular that they were though to augur doom. For instance, in 1066 Halley’s Comet preceded the Battle of Hastings, in which William the Conqueror defeated England’s Saxon king Harold.

Many comets have elliptical paths that bring them very close to the sun. A comet loses much of its material each time it approaches the sun. It has been estimated that a comet will loose all its mass in under 100 000 years. This is a serious problem for the secular view of a 4.6 billion year old solar system. If the solar system were that old, we should not see any comets.

But this has not caused believers in million of years to discard their theory. They have set their hopes on a hypothetical stretch of space called the Oort Cloud. They believe that this spherical “cloud”, which is supposed to extend up to three light years from the sun, houses millions of frozen comets that eventually find their way into an orbit that brings them closer to the sun to replace the ones that have been destroyed. The Oort Cloud is thought to provide long-term comets. The biggest problem with this explanation is there is no observational evidence for the existence of this cloud. Creationist astronomer Dr. Danny Faulkner suggests that the whole idea of the Oort Cloud “is not bad science, but non-science masquerading as science. The existence of comets is good evidence that the solar system is only a few thousand years old.” .

The Kuiper Belt has been proposed as a potential reservoir for short-term comets. It extends from Neptune’s orbit (ca 30 astronomical units or AUs ) to about 50 AU from the sun. However, most of the objects in this area which lies beyond Neptune’s orbit, are tens of times bigger than comets. These so-called Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNOs) include the recently discovered Eris (2003UB313) and Sedna (90377), which might be classified as dwarf planets. However, when compared to comets, they are giants. In order to replenish the comet supply, there should be millions of them but only 1026 TNOs have been found.

There is not enough material in either the Oort Cloud or the Kuiper Belt to supply the solar system with the number of comets that old earth supporters desperately need. Genesis 1:14-19 records that the heavenly bodies we see in the night sky were created on Day Four. The genealogies of the Bible indicate that this occurred about 6000 years ago.

The Ugly Ducklings of the solar system are not portents of doom. The message they bring is altogether different. Together with other celestial objects they “declare the glory of God” (Ps. 19: 1). The are amazing evidence for a young solar system.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joel_Kontinen

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Jun 14

Solar System Diagrams

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Solar system diagrams help readers visualize the actual positions of the planets in the solar system. They provide an easy understanding of our earth and the solar system.

The orbit diagrams of the solar system show the planes of the earth and the comets. Comet orbit diagrams show the comets’ relative movement with the sun. There are two types of orbit diagrams - outer solar system orbit diagrams and inner solar system orbit diagrams.

Outer solar system orbit diagrams show the positions of all asteroids and comets with semi-major axes. They also show orbits and positions of planets such as Earth, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, and comets like Halley and Hale-Bopp. In outer solar system orbit diagrams, asteroids and comets are shown in separate colors or blocks.

The inner solar system diagrams show the positions of all numbered asteroids and all numbered comets. The positions and orbits of the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, and Jupiter are also shown. In the diagram, asteroids and comets are represented in separate blocks or colors. Top diagrams and bottom diagrams of the inner solar system can also be plotted. The inner solar system diagram shows the location of the asteroid belt and the distribution of interplanetary dust.

Separate comet and asteroid orbit diagrams can be viewed using a java based orbit applet. The distribution of orbital elements for most known inner solar system asteroids and comets are shown using distribution diagrams such as distribution diagram of elements for comets and asteroids, distribution diagram of elements for asteroids only, and distribution diagram of semi major axis. Bifurcation diagrams show selected stable and unstable orbits and the numerical iterations depending on a parameter.

Solar System provides detailed information on Solar System, Solar System Pictures, Solar System Projects, Solar System Models and more. Solar System is affiliated with Mirror Telescopes.

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May 31

Comets

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Every few years a great comet, bright enough to be seen without a telescope, appears in the sky. Comets are a part of the solar system.

Like planets, they move in elliptical orbits around the sun. Some comets have extremely long orbits, so that they are very far from the sun a large part of the time.

One of the most famous comets was observed in 1682 by Edmund Halley, a British astronomer. It was later named for him. Halley calculated the comet’s orbit. He was able to predict that it would return on an average of every 76 years, and it has done so, last being seen in 1986. The period of time varies slightly because of the pull of the planets.

Some scientists think that a comet is a frozen ball of ice and dust, perhaps 5 to 10 kilometers (3 to 6 miles) in diameter. When the comet is far from the sun, the ice remains frozen. But the comet does come nearer to the sun, at least for a short time. Then the sun’s light and heat cause the ice to evaporate (form gases). These gases are the glowing head, or coma, of the comet, which may appear as bright as the brightest stars. The solar wind (electrically charged particles from the sun) blows back some of the gas to form the comet’s tail, which may be over 100,000,000 kilometers (60,000,000 miles) in length.

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May 25

Jupiter and The Star of Bethlehem

Planets 1 Comment »

A couple of years ago, a U.S. astronomer said he had uncovered the first reference to the star of Bethlehem outside the Bible, in the 4th-century writings of a Christian convert who wanted to hide the astrological roots of the celestial phenomenon.

For centuries, scientists and scholars have debated about the nature of the Biblical light that led the Magi to the newborn Jesus. Some have suggested a comet or supernova.

But Michael Molnar concluded that the star was actually a double eclipse of the planet Jupiter roughly 2,000 years ago.

“The Mathesis”, a book written in 334 A.D. by Firmicus Maternus, an astrologer of Constantine the Great, described the astrological event involving an eclipse of Jupiter by the Moon in the constellation of Aries (the sign of the Jews), and said that it signified the birth of a divine king.

And now, heralding the onset of Christmas, Jupiter is back in our skies, low in the west in the early evening.

It’s the largest planet in the Solar System, has a retinue of 63 satellites (at last count) and shields Earth from inbound comets. One of it’s moons, Europa, is suspected of haboring an ocean beneath its icy crust, one that has a very good chance of supporting life.

Jupiter is a spectacular planet when seen in a telescope, sporting two prominent cloud bands and its Great Red Spot, a cyclonic storm system three times the size of Earth that has blown across Jupiter for over 300 years. Glistening like diamonds, the four largest satellites orbit the planet in a matter of days in a never-ending dance. And, because we see those satellites edge-on, they alternately sail across Jupiter’s face, throwing dark shadows onto Jupiter’s clouds, or get eclipsed by Jupiter itself when they go behind the planet.

Back in 1994, an incredible spectacle unfolded in that part of the solar system. An inbound comet was torn apart by Jupiter’s immense gravitational pull. 20 fragments separated into a line of beads, each with its own cometary tail. While that in itself was spectacular, Jupiter wasn’t finished with the comet. The immense planet pulled the comet in, and all 20 fragments plummeted into Jupiter’s atmosphere and detonated in the biggest explosions seen in recorded history. And they left their mark. Visible for weeks afterward, the dark impact blotches were visible in backyard telecopes. That one event gave nations across the world pause for thought. What if such en event had happened to Earth instead of Jupiter? In all probablity, it would have been an extinction level event. It was, in part, responsible for the blockbuster movies Armageddon and Deep impact.

People like looking at the Great Red Spot, especially when you consider its size - it could contain 3 Earths - and following the motions of Jupiter’s satellites which change on a daily basis. Because Jupiter’s satellites orbit in its equatorial plane, shadows from the satellites are frequently cast onto Jupiter itself. Binoculars will show Jupiter and its satellites, but you’ll need a telescope to see the Great Red Spot or the satellites’ shadows.

Some of the best astrophotgraphers (amateur astronomers with largeish telescopes and equipment for taking images through them) have taken some stunning views of Jupiter. And there are even time-lapse sequences which show the planet rotating, satellites crossing it and the odd shadow drifiting across Jupiter’s face.

So it’s fair to say that Jupiter and its environs is one pretty interesting place. But knowing what to look for, and when, is key to making the most of any Jovian observing experience.

Gary Nugent has been creating astronomy software applications for over 10 years and has run the popular Night Sky Observer website during that time: http://www.nightskyobserver.com

Jupsat Pro is a software application dedicated to modeling Jupiter and its satellites: http://www.nightskyobserver.com/JupSatPro