ASTRONOMY Chapter 10

The canals that late 19th and early 20th observers thought they saw on Mars turned out to be:

optical illusion

Which of the following would NOT be one of the problems faced by an unprotected Earthling stranded on Mars? (Unprotected meaning no space suit.)

the extreme (high) heat at most latitudes

The process by which Venus became so much hotter than the Earth is called:

the runnaway greenhouse effect

The same gas makes up most of the atmosphere of Mars and Venus. This gas is:

Carbon Dioxide

The Viking spacecraft were designed -- in part -- to search for life on Mars. Which of the following statements about the results of these experiments is true?

Viking found that the surface of Mars in the two places it searched did not have any life or even life's building blocks

About 75% of the surface of Venus consists of

lowland lava plains

A crucial difference that helps explain why Venus is so hot and the Earth isn't is that:

on Venus, the rocks have enormous amounts of radioactivity, heating up the environment (and also making life impossible)

On some parts of Mars, it gets cold enough for a gas to freeze out of the atmosphere that does not freeze out by itself at the temperatures and pressures on Earth. This gas makes up some of the polar caps on Mars and is:

CArbon Dioxide

Which of the following is evidence for volcanic activity on Venus?

All of the above

The largest continental (highland) area on Venus is called:

Aphrodite

The spacecraft that sent back the most detailed radar images of Venus and showed us features as small as a football field is:

Magellan

The first spacecraft to orbit another planet circled Mars in 1971. It was:

Mariner 9

Why is it so much easier to determine the length of the day on Mars than on Venus?

Mars' atmosphere is generally pretty clear (so the surface is visible) while Venus is always cloudy

The observation that began the 19th and early 20th century fascination with Mars as a place for life was:

Schiaparelli's seeing what seemed to him to be long straight features on the red planet

The Magellan spacecraft revealed a wide variety of volcanic features on Venus, including some that looked like ticks and spiders. What instrument aboard Magellan was used for these investigations?

Spectrograph

The large circular coronae on Venus are:

The large circular coronae on Venus are:

One way in which Mars closely resembles the Earth is its what?

The length of the day

The total surface area of planet Mars is roughly equal to the

The total surface area of planet Mars is roughly equal to the

The spacecraft that soft-landed successfully on the surface of Venus (and briefly sent back pictures while sitting in that destructive environment) were called

Venera

What planet can come closest to the Earth in its orbit and look brightest in our skies?

Venus

The troposphere (the lowest layer in the atmosphere) of Venus

has roughly the same air pressure as the troposphere of the Earth

Astronomers believe that Mars formed with a much thicker atmosphere than it has today. Where did this atmosphere go?

it escaped into space (and some later froze out as Mars got cold)

Which of the following statements about the planet Venus is true?

it has a thick layer of clouds containing sulfuric acid droplets

Valles Marineris is a wide, deep network of chasms stretching for some 2500 miles on the surface of Mars. How do we believe such a big set of canyons formed originally?

it was caused by tectonic pressures from deep within the planet

Which of the following is NOT YET a way we have studied the planet Mars so far?

landing a spacecraft on the surface and examining the soil in an automated laboratory

Which of the following is NOT one of the key reasons that so many spacecraft from Earth have visited Venus and Mars?

their atmospheres are very similar to the Earth in terms of their chemical make-up

Mars rovers (such as Opportunity and Curiosity) have identified evidence that their landing sites were once under water. Which of the following is among the kinds of evidence they have identified?

they found rock formations that show the area was under water and also minerals that only form in water

Mars appears to have long branching channels that have the appearance of being formed by a flowing liquid. Yet we know that liquids would not stay liquid in the very thin atmosphere we have on the Martian surface? So how can we explain the channels?

they were formed by volcanic lava from Olympus Mons