Saturday 30 March 2013

Mars- The second smalllest planet

Though the name Mars, which named after the Roman god of war because of the red color. Mars usually appears a distinct orange, or reddish color; the actual color of Mars is closer to butterscotch, and the redness seen is just dust in the planet's atmosphere.




Do you know?
Mars can easily be seen from Earth with the naked eye.which is surpassed only by Jupiter, Venus, the Moon, and the Sun.











     Since it is the first planet to be located behind the earth (from sun) in the solar system and because the orbit of Mars is eccentric, its apparent magnitude at opposition from the Sun can range from −3.0 to −1.4.

     Mars got two moons named Phobos and Deimos, these are most probably captured asteroids from the asteroid belt that is in between Jupiter and Mars. Mars got a dusty atmosphere and sun from this planet almost looks like a bright disc of diameter roughly half of the full moon disc when seen from earth.
     
   
      

 Do you know?
Mars got a diameter that is approximately half the earth's diameter.







       Liquid water cannot exist on the surface of Mars due to low atmospheric pressure. Mars has two permanent polar ice caps. During a pole's winter, it lies in continuous darkness, chilling the surface and causing the deposition of 25–30% of the atmosphere into slabs of CO2 ice (dry ice). When the poles are again exposed to sunlight, the frozen CO2 sublimes, creating enormous winds that sweep off the poles as fast as 400 km/h. These seasonal actions transport large amounts of dust and water vapor, giving rise to Earth-like frost and large cirrus clouds.



The image shows the shield volcano, Olympus Mons (Mount Olympus).



Do you know? 
Olympus Mons (which is 27 km & is the second highest known mountain in the Solar System,) is over three times the height of Mount Everest which in comparison stands at just over 8.8 km.





     The solar day on Mars is only slightly longer than an Earth day: 24 hours, 39 minutes, and 35.244 seconds. A Martian year is equal to 1.8809 Earth years, or 1 year, 320 days, and 18.2 hours. Mars lost its magnetosphere 4 billion years ago, so the solar wind interacts directly with the Martian ionosphere, lowering the atmospheric density by stripping away atoms from the outer layer.




 Few other characteristics of Mars:

Escape velocity                   :
5.027 km/s
Equatorial rotation velocity :
241.17 m/s
Surface pressure                 :
0.636 KPa
Euatorial radius                    :
3,396.2 km
Axial tilt                                  :
Gravitational acceleration
on surface                             :
3.711 m/s2









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