When seen through a telescope, the eighth and most distant planet from the sun appears sky-blue or as a uniform, peaceful ocean world that would have made the Roman god of the sea proud. As such, it was among the last to be discovered in by Johann Galle, based on mathematical predictions made by Urbain Le Verrier.
It was really a stroke of luck that Neptune was so aptly named when astronomers could not have known that the planet is all blue. Similarly to Uranus, Neptune is one-fifth hydrogen and helium by mass. Join the ZME newsletter for amazing science news, features, and exclusive scoops.
More than 40, subscribers can't be wrong. Despite their similarities in size and composition, Neptune and Uranus are distinctly colored. Further down, there may be clouds of hydrogen sulfide, ammonium sulfide, ammonia, and water. Methane absorbs red light at wavelengths of billionths of a meter, so when sunlight falls on these two planets, red light is absorbed and bluer light is reflected back. This happens even though there are actually only trace amounts of methane in their atmospheres.
However, Uranus's appearance differs from that of Neptune. As well as being visually featureless, Uranus is a more azure, blue-green color. This tells scientists that another, additional chromophore in Neptune's atmosphere is responsible for its deep blue color. That component has not yet been identified, so the true nature of Neptune's color will remain a mystery for some time yet.
New telescope technology improves view of 'blandest' Uranus. New Horizons crosses Neptune's orbit 25 years after Voyager 2. Which planets have ring systems? If you would like updates from Sen you can join our free mailing list. Neptune atmosphere color Methane. The moons of Neptune. Since Neptune was named for the Roman god of the sea, its moons are named for various lesser sea gods and nymphs in Greek mythology.
Triton is the only large moon in the solar system that circles its planet in a direction opposite to the planet's rotation a retrograde orbit , which suggests that it may once have been an independent object that Neptune captured. Triton is extremely cold, with surface temperatures around minus degrees Fahrenheit minus degrees Celsius.
And yet, despite this deep freeze at Triton, Voyager 2 discovered geysers spewing icy material upward more than 5 miles 8 kilometers. Triton's thin atmosphere, also discovered by Voyager, has been detected from Earth several times since, and is growing warmer, but scientists do not yet know why.
Neptune has at least five main rings and four prominent ring arcs that we know of so far. Starting near the planet and moving outward, the main rings are named Galle, Leverrier, Lassell, Arago, and Adams. The rings are thought to be relatively young and short-lived.
Neptune's ring system also has peculiar clumps of dust called arcs. The arcs are strange because the laws of motion would predict that they would spread out evenly rather than stay clumped together. Scientists now think the gravitational effects of Galatea, a moon just inward from the ring, stabilizes these arcs. Neptune took shape when the rest of the solar system formed about 4. Like its neighbor Uranus, Neptune likely formed closer to the Sun and moved to the outer solar system about 4 billion years ago.
Neptune is one of two ice giants in the outer solar system the other is Uranus. Of the giant planets, Neptune is the densest. Scientists think there might be an ocean of super hot water under Neptune's cold clouds.
It does not boil away because incredibly high pressure keeps it locked inside. Neptune does not have a solid surface. Its atmosphere made up mostly of hydrogen, helium, and methane extends to great depths, gradually merging into water and other melted ices over a heavier, solid core with about the same mass as Earth. Neptune's atmosphere is made up mostly of hydrogen and helium with just a little bit of methane. Neptune's neighbor Uranus is a blue-green color due to such atmospheric methane, but Neptune is a more vivid, brighter blue, so there must be an unknown component that causes the more intense color.
Neptune is our solar system's windiest world. Despite its great distance and low energy input from the Sun, Neptune's winds can be three times stronger than Jupiter's and nine times stronger than Earth's. These winds whip clouds of frozen methane across the planet at speeds of more than 1, miles per hour 2, kilometers per hour. Even Earth's most powerful winds hit only about miles per hour kilometers per hour. In a large, oval-shaped storm in Neptune's southern hemisphere dubbed the "Great Dark Spot" was large enough to contain the entire Earth.
That storm has since disappeared, but new ones have appeared on different parts of the planet. The main axis of Neptune's magnetic field is tipped over by about 47 degrees compared with the planet's rotation axis.
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