The Asteroid Belt

By Chandler Moy & Samuel Freisem-Kirov

Gravitational Pulls

• The Asteroid Belt is beyond the reach of Mars’s orbit but not beyond the reach of Mars’s gravitational pull

• The gravitational pull form Jupiter prevents protoplanetary bodies (something didn’t grow into a planet) from growing larger than 1000 km

• The Asteroid Belt is beyond the gravitational pull of Sol• The Asteroid Belt is affected by the Sun’s gravitational

pull only by a little bit• The main forces on the Asteroid Belt are Jupiter and

Mars

Tools for Discovery and Investigation

• One main tool for discovery and investigation is using space craft such as the Galileo space probe

• Another main tool for discovery and investigation would be space telescopes

• The space telescopes could be in space (example: Hubble), or you could see an asteroid from the ground using a regular telescope

Earth Passing Asteroids

• An Earth Passing Asteroid is a large cosmic interloper which comes close to Earth

• This happens when an asteroid breaks off from the asteroid belt and then it makes a plunge

• An Earth Passing asteroid would cause concern because if it would to hit Earth, the effects could be catastrophic

• If the asteroid hit land, it could create a huge crater and make a huge dust cloud, if it hit the sea, it could create big tidal waves

Asteroid Belt Objects

• The objects that are in the Asteroid Belt are different then any other object because they weren’t able to form into planets

• Also, the asteroids are not able to be full planets because of Jupiter’s gravitational pull on the asteroids

The Kuiper Belt

H2O

• The water in this planet is in the form of ice• It is in an ice form because it is too cold to

have regular water on it• Also, it is thought that comets come from the

Kuiper Belt because most of the objects in the Kuiper Belt are made out of ice

States of Matter and Materials

• Like I said before, most of the objects in the Kuiper Belt are made out of ice

• Also, they are also have some rock in them as well

• For some reason some of these icy bodies are unusually red

• Also, for some reason, the icy bodies tend to have dark nucleuses inside them

Rotation

• Many of these objects orbit around Neptune with a 3:2 ratio

• That means every two times Neptune rotates around the sun, those Asteroids will rotate around Neptune 3 times

• Some of the other icy bodies orbit around Jupiter

Why are people interested in the matter of the icy bodies?• People are interested in the icy bodies in the

Kuiper belt because they have reason to believe that the Kuiper Belt is the source of comets

• People believe that because of the matter that composes of the icy bodies

• That matter is the same materials that make comets

Kuiper Belt Objects

• The objects in the Kuiper Belt differ from other objects in the solar system because they are very icy

• Also the Kuiper Belt one of places where comets are thought to come from

Bibliography

• "The Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, Tech." Strange Propeller-Like Object Discovered in the Outer Reaches of the Kuiper Belt. The Daily Galaxy, 4 Oct. 2011. Web. 18 Apr.2012.<http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2011/10/-weird-propeller-shaped-object-discovered-in-the-outer-reaches-of-the-kuiper-belt.html>.

Bibliography

• Arnett, Bill. "The Kuiper BeltandThe Oort Cloud." Kuiper-Oort. Nine Planets, 18 Mar. 2007. Web. 17 Apr. 2012. <http://nineplanets.org/kboc.html>.

• Jewitt, David. "Kuiper Belt." UCLA. Comet, 2009. Web. 18 Apr. 2012. <http://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/kb.html>.

Bibliography cont.

• "Kuiper Belt Objects." Science Photo Library. Science Photo Library. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. <http://www.sciencephoto.com/media/327689/enlarge>.

• Fuller, John. "How Asteroid Belts Work." HowStuffWorks. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. <http://www.howstuffworks.com/asteroid-belt.htm>.

The End