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The superior planets, orbiting outside the Earth's orbit, do not exhibit a full range of phases since their maximum phase angles are smaller than 90°. Mars often appears significantly gibbous, it has a maximum phase angle of 45°. Jupiter has a maximum phase angle of 11.1° and Saturn of 6°, [1] so their phases are almost always full.
The apparent brightness of Mercury as seen from Earth is greatest at phase angle 0° (superior conjunction with the Sun) when it can reach magnitude −2.6. [14] At phase angles approaching 180° (inferior conjunction) the planet fades to about magnitude +5 [14] with the exact brightness depending on the phase angle at that particular ...
This diagram shows various possible elongations (ε), each of which is the angular distance between a planet and the Sun from Earth's perspective. In astronomy, a planet's elongation is the angular separation between the Sun and the planet, with Earth as the reference point. [1] The greatest elongation is the maximum angular separation.
For some objects, such as the Moon (see lunar phases), Venus and Mercury the phase angle (as seen from the Earth) covers the full 0–180° range. The superior planets cover shorter ranges. For example, for Mars the maximum phase angle is about 45°. For Jupiter, the maximum is 11.1° and for Saturn 6°. [1]
In the reference frame of the Earth, where the terms were originally used, the inferior planets are Mercury and Venus, while the superior planets are Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Dwarf planets like Ceres or Pluto and most asteroids are 'superior' in the sense that they almost all orbit outside the orbit of Earth.
For example, the synodic period of the Moon's orbit as seen from Earth, relative to the Sun, is 29.5 mean solar days, since the Moon's phase and position relative to the Sun and Earth repeats after this period. This is longer than the sidereal period of its orbit around Earth, which is 27.3 mean solar days, owing to the motion of Earth around ...
[13] [14] Similarly, Earth has an effective temperature of 255 K (−18 °C; −1 °F), [14] but a surface temperature of about 288 K (15 °C; 59 °F) [15] due to the greenhouse effect in our lower atmosphere. [5] [4] The surface temperatures of such planets are more accurately estimated by modeling thermal radiation transport through the ...
The relationship is represented by the equation: = where L ⊙ and M ⊙ are the luminosity and mass of the Sun and 1 < a < 6. [2] The value a = 3.5 is commonly used for main-sequence stars. [ 3 ] This equation and the usual value of a = 3.5 only applies to main-sequence stars with masses 2 M ⊙ < M < 55 M ⊙ and does not apply to red giants ...