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720,000 km/h (450,000 mi/h) [10] Orbital period. ~230 million years [10] The Solar System [d] is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. [11] It was formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
The Solar System travels alone through the Milky Way in a circular orbit approximately 30,000 light years from the Galactic Center. Its speed is about 220 km/s. The period required for the Solar System to complete one revolution around the Galactic Center, the galactic year, is in the range of 220–250 million years. Since its formation, the ...
Sun. The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light and infrared radiation with 10% at ultraviolet energies.
The eight planets of the Solar System with size to scale (up to down, left to right): Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune (outer planets), Earth, Venus, Mars, and Mercury (inner planets) A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is generally required to be in orbit around a star, stellar remnant, or brown dwarf, and is not one itself. [1]
Parts-per-million chart of the relative mass distribution of the Solar System, each cubelet denoting 2 × 10 24 kg. This article includes a list of the most massive known objects of the Solar System and partial lists of smaller objects by observed mean radius. These lists can be sorted according to an object's radius and mass and, for the most ...
The Solar System Portal. The Sun and planets of the Solar System (distances not to scale) The Solar System is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. It was formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
The history of scientific thought about the formation and evolution of the Solar System began with the Copernican Revolution. The first recorded use of the term "Solar System" dates from 1704. [1] [2] Since the seventeenth century, philosophers and scientists have been forming hypotheses concerning the origins of our Solar System and the Moon ...
At that time, Uranus, Neptune, nor the asteroid belts have been discovered yet. Discovery and exploration of the Solar System is observation, visitation, and increase in knowledge and understanding of Earth 's "cosmic neighborhood". [1] This includes the Sun, Earth and the Moon, the major planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus ...