PHYS1160 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Oort Cloud, Venus Express, Outer Core

• School: UNSW, UNSW Sydney
• Department: Physics
• Course: PHYS1160
• Professor: Dr Jimmy Carl

Document Summary

Note: earth - only place, we know that hosts life. Organisms depend on energy from the sun. Food contains energy, that energy comes from plants, plants obtain energy from the sun. Energy to use our machines and almost all cases comes from the sun. Oil / coal = solar energy extracted from sun hundreds of millions of years ago by plants that decayed and converted into fossil fuels. Sun: other elements account for 2% of solar mass because big bang start with h and he, other elements were synthesised later in the star core. Terrestrial planets (earth = 1au from the sun and inner plants range 0. 4 - 1. 5 au from the sun) The main asteroid belt (2 - 4 au, composed of asteroids), separates the inner and outer planets. Giant planets (jovian planets, 5 - 30 au, composed of mostly gas) The edgeworth-kuiper belt (asteroid belt, 35 - 500 au) The oort cloud (50,000 au, spherical shape)