Astronomy Quiz 9

High speed electrons spiraling around the planets strong magnetic field

The synchrotron radiation (radio waves) that astronomers first observed from Jupiter in the 1950's comes from:

Hydrogen

By far the most abundant element in the giant (jovian) planet is:

Saturn's orbit

Jupiter's magnetic field stretches all the way to:

2080

Suppose humanity established a floating colony near the south pole of Uranus, called Cloud City. If the year is 2038, and "summer" has just come to an end, what year will the inhabitants of Cloud City see sunlight again?

Hydrogen

The element that can act like a metal when it is under tremendous pressure and is probably responsible for Jupiter and Saturn's magnetism is:

Jupiter

The largest planet in the solar system (by mass) is:

The four planets were approximately aligned on one side of the Sun and we used the gravity of each planet to speed up the spacecraft to get to the next one in its path

What allowed Voyager 2 spacecraft to make a "tour" of all four of the jovian planets in the late 1970's and the late 1980's?

The rates of rotation are determined by the rotation of the planets' magnetic fields

What determines the "official" rotational rates for the giant planets?

The frost line

What is the name of the imaginary boundary in our solar system past which volatile compounds can freeze?

Primordial heat from when the planets formed.

What is the source of Jupiter and Saturn's internal heat?