Astronomy Exam 2
the largest volcano on mars is called what?
Olympus Mons (Mt. Olympus)
The Viking spacecraft was 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
Today, a significant amount of new gas is joining the atmosphere of the Earth from what source?
Volcanoes release gas that was trapped within the Earth
The Van Allen belt is
a region of trapped charged particles in the Earth's magnetosphere
The planets fall into 2 groups based on?
location, size and density
Terrestrial planets?
small, dense, and rocky, large cores of iron and nickel, low escape velocities, thin atmospheres of carbon dioxide or nitrogen, ALL of Above
Which of the following is a way we believe that the early atmosphere of the earth differed?
there was little if any free oxygen early on, there was no ozone layer early on, and there was probably more carbon dioxide early on than there is today.
a polar ice cap or polar cap is a high-latitude region of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite that is covered in ice true or false
true
The Red Spot of Jupiter is?
variable in size, a high pressure storm system in the atmosphere, made of a reddish colored material, long-lived. ALL of Above
What is the one way that we humans are currently making the atmosphere of the earth more like that of venus
we are adding carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, which is leading to global warming
Which part of the Earth has the greatest density?
Core
in Jupiter near the top of its atmosphere lie white wispy clouds of carbon ice true or false
false
Which of the following is not part of some active regions on the Sun?
granulation
Asteroids are made of ( 2 answers)
Metal and Rocky materials
Which of the following statements about the violent events on the sun called flares is FALSE?
astronomers think that flares are connected with sudden changes in the magnetic field of the Sun
Solar wind particles can be captured by the Earth's magnetosphere. When these particles spiral down along the magnetic field into the atmosphere, they are responsible for?
aurorae ( northern and southern light)
venus orbits the sun in a nearly perfect circle once every __________ Earth-days
225
Uranus and Neptune consist in large part of compounds of ?
Carbon, Nitrogen, and Oxygen
Convergent, plates move apart (Oceanic Ridges) True or False
False
Coronal holes are part of the Sun's corona and are constantly changing and reshaping because the corona is uniform True and False
False
Slow motions within the mantle of the Earth move large sections of the mantle around caused the plate tectonic True or False
False
The most common element in the sun is?
Hydrogen
Jupiter and Saturn are composed primarily of?
Hydrogen and Helium
The largest planet in the solar system (by mass) is
Jupiter
A large bright gaseous feature extending outward from the Sun's surface, often in a loop shape is called?
Prominence
A positive velocity on the giant planets means that the winds are blowing in the same direction as, but faster than, the planet's internal rotation true or false
True
A solar flare is a sudden flash of increased brightness on the sun, usually observed near its surface and in close proximity to a sunspot group True or Flase
True
Everything in Venus is orange because the thick atmosphere of venus absorbs the bluer colors of light True or false
True
Streaks appear seasonally on mars steep, warm Martian slopes, thought to form from briny (salt) water True or false
True
the colors in Jupiter are thought to be by-products of chemical reactions occurring in Jupiter's atmosphere True or False
True
What planet can come closest to the earth in its orbit and look brightest in our skies?
Venus
the same gas makes up most of the atmosphere of mars and venus. This is gas is
carbon dioxide
If no one has ever visited the core of the Earth, how do we know that it is made of metals?
circulating liquid metals in the core set up a large (measurable) magnetic field
Mantle plumes produced large volumes of lava, but plate tectonics allowed it to accumulate to make enormous volcanoes true or false
false
Saturn's winds move slower than those of the other planets true or false
false
the ten million tons of particles that escape the sun each year in the form of the solar wind get out mainly through regions called
coronal holes
The granulation pattern that astronomers have observed on the surface of the sun tells us that?
hot material must be rising from the Sun's hotter interior
Any rock in the Earth's crust that has cooled from an originally molten state is called
igneous
As astronomers have learned more about the structure of the Sun, they have found that it has a small solid core inside
is made entirely of hot gas
The most abundant gas in the Earth's atmosphere is?
nitrogen
the sun's photosphere is
the part of the sun from which the light comes that we see when we look at the sun with our eyes
which of the following is NOT a way that Venus resembles the earth?
the thickness and pressure of its atmosphere
One of the most pronounced differences between Uranus and Neptune is?
the time they take to complete one revolution around the sun
In which region of the Earth's atmosphere have you spent most of your life?
the troposphere