enow.com Web Search

Search results

  1. Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
  2. Asteroid - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid

    Sizes are not to scale. An asteroid is a minor planet —an object that is neither a true planet nor an identified comet — that orbits within the inner Solar System. They are rocky, metallic, or icy bodies with no atmosphere, classified as C-type (carbonaceous), M-type (metallic), or S-type (silicaceous). The size and shape of asteroids vary ...

  3. Asteroid belt - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_belt

    Individual asteroids within the belt are categorized by their spectra, with most falling into three basic groups: carbonaceous , silicate , and metal-rich . The asteroid belt formed from the primordial solar nebula as a group of planetesimals, [9] the smaller precursors of the protoplanets.

  4. Solar System belts - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_System_belts

    The Solar System belts were formed in the formation and evolution of the Solar System. [6] [7] The Grand tack hypothesis is a model of the unique placement of the giant planets and the Solar System belts. [3] [4] [8] Most giant planets found outside our Solar System, exoplanets, are inside the snow line, and are called Hot Jupiters.

  5. Nebular hypothesis - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebular_hypothesis

    v. t. e. The nebular hypothesis is the most widely accepted model in the field of cosmogony to explain the formation and evolution of the Solar System (as well as other planetary systems). It suggests the Solar System is formed from gas and dust orbiting the Sun which clumped up together to form the planets. The theory was developed by Immanuel ...

  6. Accretion (astrophysics) - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accretion_(astrophysics)

    Chondrules, metal grains, and other components likely formed in the solar nebula. These accreted together to form parent asteroids. Some of these bodies subsequently melted, forming metallic cores and olivine-rich mantles; others were aqueously altered. [35] After the asteroids had cooled, they were eroded by impacts for 4.5 billion years, or ...

  7. Kuiper belt - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuiper_belt

    The Kuiper belt (/ ˈkaɪpər / KY-pər) [ 1 ] is a circumstellar disc in the outer Solar System, extending from the orbit of Neptune at 30 astronomical units (AU) to approximately 50 AU from the Sun. [ 2 ] It is similar to the asteroid belt, but is far larger—20 times as wide and 20–200 times as massive. [ 3 ][ 4 ] Like the asteroid belt ...

  8. Solar System - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_System

    720,000 km/h (450,000 mi/h) [ 10 ] Orbital period. ~230 million years [ 10 ] The Solar System[ d ] is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. [ 11 ] It formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.

  9. Asteroid family - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_family

    Eos family. The Eos family(adj. Eoan; 9,789 members, named after 221 Eos) Eunomia family. The Eunomia family(adj. Eunomian; 5,670 known members, named after 15 Eunomia) is a family of S-type asteroids. It is the most prominent family in the intermediateasteroid belt and the 6th-largest family with approximately 1.4% of all main belt asteroids.