Celestial Bodies Celestial of or relating to the

Celestial Bodies Celestial: of or relating to the sky objects

Introduction Do scientists know all about our galaxy, the Milky Way? No. There is much that waits to be discovered. Celestial bodies are constellations, comets, meteors, asteroids, galaxies, and basically everything in space.

Comets are made of dust, stones, ice, and frozen gases. Their tail is made of gas and dust and faces away from the solar wind coming from the Sun. They are only a few miles across, but when the sun heats them, they turn to gas and expand to thousands of miles across. Their ellipse (orbit) is shaped like a flat beach ball. One famous comet is Halley’s Comet. It is seen every 76 years. It’s discoverer was Edmund Halley, who discovered it in 1682.

An asteroid is a huge chunk of stone and metal left over from the creation of the Solar System. Asteroids The Asteroid Belt Famous Asteroids Name Diameter • Ceres • 584 mi • Vesta • 335 mi • Pallas • 326 mi • Hygeia • 267 mi • Interamnia • 202 mi • Davida • 202 mi u u u Between Mars and Jupiter (or the divider between the near and far planets) Maybe over one million asteroids over 0. 5 miles across A planet may have once existed there, the asteroids may be leftover debris of the planet

Meteors are made up of rock and dust. Meteors are smaller than asteroids. They are called meteorites when they hit planets. The biggest meteor ever found was Hoba West and weighed 66 Tons. There are small meteors called micrometeoroids. Meteor showers are seen as streaks of light. Some people call them shooting stars. A lot of times, these shooting stars come in showers over several nights.

Galaxies u u u Our galaxy is called the Milky Way, a spiral galaxy. There are four main types of galaxies, Spiral, Elliptical, Irregular, and Barred. Spiral. Our Solar System is found in the outer reaches of the Milky Way, and is a tiny speck compared to the vast Milky Way. Millions of Solar Systems, or groups of stars and planets are in the Milky Way. Galaxies are so big that even the small ones take billions of light years to cross. Galaxies are formed by clouds of spinning gasses, and some of those clouds still spin. Local Galaxies Andromeda M 33 Large Magellanic Cloud Small Magellanic Cloud NGC 8822 NGC 205

Stars and Constellations Stars are a gaseous mass within space that give off light. They live more or less than 10 billion years. One of the mysteries about stars is why do the stars twinkle? We have the answer. As the light travels through earth’s atmosphere, turbulence in the atmosphere messes with some and make them look like they are twinkling. Constellations are a group of stars that form a path, creating a picture. Long ago, people named stars and constellations after animals, gods, and heroes. The next couple slides will go in depth with some.

The Life of a Star 1. ) Nebulae (cloud of gases) 2. ) Dwarf Star 3. ) Expanding Star 4. ) Red Giant Star 5. )Shrinking Star 6. )White Dwarf Star

Fall and Winter Constellations in the Northern Hemisphere Winter Fall u u u u Androneda Aquarius Aries Cetus Grus Lacerta Pegasus Perseus* Phoenix Piscis Austrinus Pisces Sculpton Triangulum u u u u *Has details on “Details” page u Auriga Caelum Canis Major Canis Minor Carina Columba Eridanus* Fornax Gemini Horologium Lepus Monoceros Orion Pictor Puppis Reticulum Taurus Vela

Spring and Summer Constellations in the Northern Hemisphere u u u u u Spring Antlia Bootes* Cancer Canes Venatici Centaurus Coma Berenices Corvus Crater Hydra Leo Minor Lupus Lynx Pyxis Sextans Virgo Summer u u u u u Aquila Ara Capricornus Corona Australis Corona Borealis Cygnus Hercules Delphinus Equuleus Indus Libra Lyra Microscopium Ophiuchus* Scorpius Scutum Sagittarius Telescopium Vulpecula

Constellation Details Fall/Winter Spring/Summer Eridanus u u u u u Mid-November to late December Long line of stars named after mythological Greek river One star, Epsilon Eridai, 10. 8 light years away Another star, Achernar, 85 light years away Bootes Perseus u Mid-September to mid-November Resembles Perseus, ancient Greek hero Many open star clusters One star, Algol, has an eclipse for almost 3 days, one star passes in front of it and Algol fades to nearly ½ of its brightness A meteor shower occurs between July 25 and August 20 in Perseus u u Found in Spring Looks like a herdsmen Ophinchus u Found in Summer Greeks thought it looked like it held a snake

Wow Fun Facts u u u u Stars change by moving, because the Big Dipper wasn’t the shape of a dipper at first, but many years later it changed and looked like a big dipper. The universe is still expanding by the Big Bang. The big bang was the asteroid that might have killed the dinosaurs. There are many galaxies like M 33, M 32, Wolf- Lundmark, and Etc. Stars move approximately ten miles each second. Our galaxy is a spiral galaxy. An asteroid called Ida has a moon. Comets, meteors and asteroids are different because we often see meteors, but not comets or asteroids. Some comets are so far away that you can’t see them move. In olden times, comets were called a bad omen.