Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Many TNOs are often just assumed to have Pluto's density of 2.0 g/cm 3, but it is just as likely that they have a comet-like density of only 0.5 g/cm 3. [ 4 ] For example, if a TNO is incorrectly assumed to have a mass of 3.59 × 10 20 kg based on a radius of 350 km with a density of 2 g/cm 3 but is later discovered to have a radius of only 175 ...
Like Pluto, its orbit is highly eccentric, with a perihelion of 38.2 AU (roughly Pluto's distance from the Sun) and an aphelion of 97.6 AU, and steeply inclined to the ecliptic plane at an angle of 44°. [220] Gonggong (33.8–101.2 AU) is a dwarf planet in a comparable orbit to Eris, except that it is in a 3:10 resonance with Neptune.
One particularly distant body is 90377 Sedna, which was discovered in November 2003.It has an extremely eccentric orbit that takes it to an aphelion of 937 AU. [2] It takes over 10,000 years to orbit, and during the next 50 years it will slowly move closer to the Sun as it comes to perihelion at a distance of 76 AU from the Sun. [3] Sedna is the largest known sednoid, a class of objects that ...
Pluto (bottom left) compared in size to the Earth and the Moon. Pluto's diameter is 2 376.6 ± 3.2 km [5] and its mass is (1.303 ± 0.003) × 10 22 kg, 17.7% that of the Moon (0.22% that of Earth). [125] Its surface area is 1.774 443 × 10 7 km 2, or just slightly bigger than Russia or Antarctica (particularly including the Antarctic sea ice ...
The choice of solar mass, M ☉, as the basic unit for planetary mass comes directly from the calculations used to determine planetary mass.In the most precise case, that of the Earth itself, the mass is known in terms of solar masses to twelve significant figures: the same mass, in terms of kilograms or other Earth-based units, is only known to five significant figures, which is less than a ...
The Sun and planets of the Solar System (distances not to scale). The Solar System is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. It formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
Charon, a moon of Pluto that was proposed as a dwarf planet by the IAU in 2006, is included for comparison. Those objects that have absolute magnitude greater than +1, and so meet the threshold of the joint planet–minor planet naming committee of the IAU, are highlighted, as is Ceres, which the IAU has assumed is a dwarf planet since they ...
The orbit of Sedna (red) set against the orbits of outer Solar System objects (Pluto's orbit is purple). This is a list of Solar System objects by greatest aphelion or the greatest distance from the Sun that the orbit could take it if the Sun and object were the only objects in the universe.