ASTRON C10 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Late Heavy Bombardment, Galilean Moons, Tidal Acceleration
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ASTRON C10 Full Course Notes
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What"s a planet: a body that primarily orbits the sun, massive enough to have become roughly spherical due to gravity. A dwarf planet has the first two features: has cleared most of the other objects. Atmosphere: 79% nitrogen, 21% oxygen (due to photosynthesis) The moon is heavily cratered because of impacts; lava flows created maria (covered surface); due to low erosion, we can get the relative ages of features. Tides 2 high tides and 2 low tides per day. We always see the same side of the moon its orbit and rotation are in synch due to tidal friction. The moon probably coalesced from debris ejected by the collision of a mars-sized object with earth, shortly after earth formed. It"s difficult to study because it"s always around the sun in the sky. No atmosphere resulted in the great t difference between daytime and night. It"s shrouded in highly reflective clods and close to the earth and the sun.
