You Discover A Small Body In Our Solar System A Comet Or Asteroid And After Measuring Its Path

What is the difference between comets and asteriods?

asteroids are basically giant rocks floating in space. they range in size from a few feet to several miles in diameter and most are found between mars and jupiter in the space known as the asteroid belt. Some astronomers believe this space was once occupied by a large rocky planet that was broken apart and the pieces orbit now as asteroids.

Comets are really just large balls of rock and ice. Many astronomers refer to them as "dirty snowballs" or "icy mudballs" because that is exactly what they look like. The ice that forms a comet can consist of both water ice and frozen gases. The famous tail part of the comet is formed only when the comet gets close to the sun. When the comet heats up, gas and dust get expelled and this flying debris is in turn lit by the sun. It is believed that comets come from the large ring of material at the edge of the solar system called the oort cloud, and also from the kuiper belt; the gravity of stars would periodically push these comets out of the belt/cloud towards the sun.

if you want more info, i think this site has an especially good and easy to understand explination! hope that helped!

http://www.seasky.org/cosmic/sky7a04.html

Tell me everything you know about asteroids!!!!!!!?

Asteroids, also called minor planets or planetoids, are a class of astronomical object. The term asteroid is generally used to indicate a diverse group of small celestial bodies that drift in the solar system in orbit around the Sun. Asteroid (Greek for "star-like") is the word used most in the English literature for minor planets, which has been the term preferred by the International Astronomical Union; some other languages prefer planetoid (Greek: "planet-like"), because it more accurately describes what they are. In late August 2006, the IAU introduced the term "small solar system bodies" (SSSBs), which includes most objects thusfar classified as minor planets, as well as comets. At the same time they introduced the term dwarf planet for the largest minor planets. This article deals specifically with the minor planets that orbit in the inner solar system (roughly up to the orbit of Jupiter). For other types of objects, such as comets, Trans-Neptunian objects, and Centaurs, see Small solar system body.

The first asteroid to be discovered in the Solar System, Ceres, is the largest asteroid known to date and is now classified as a dwarf planet. All others are currently classified as small solar system bodies. The vast majority of asteroids are found within the main asteroid belt, with elliptical orbits between those of Mars and Jupiter. It is thought that these asteroids are remnants of the protoplanetary disc, and in this region the incorporation of protoplanetary remnants into the planets was prevented by large gravitational perturbations induced by Jupiter during the formative period of the solar system. Some asteroids have moons or are found in pairs known as binary systems.

What is the difference between our solar system and our galaxy?

what our solar system is called - Our solar system is nestled inside a very large galaxy of stars called the Milky Way.

what exactly is a galaxy - A galaxy is a cluster of stars, nebulae, dark matter, and other astronomical objects.

where is our place in it? - The galaxy in which we live is probably a typical spiral galaxy, although recent research shows it has a small bar across the center, making it a barred spiral. It is an island of tens of billions of stars together with gas and dust.
It is roughly the shape of a "flying saucer", with a bulge in the middle of a flat disc. Stars and dust are arranged into spirals within the disc, which measures about 100,000 light years across. Ancient globular star clusters form a halo around the Galaxy.
We live near a star (the Sun) roughly half way out along the disc. When we look at the night sky we can see a mass of distant stars in the disc, partly hidden by clouds of dust. These stars we call the Milky Way, and this is how our galaxy gets its name. It is sometimes just called the Galaxy.
The Milky Way is the second largest galaxy in the small cluster to which it belongs.

How many solar systems are there? - Several other stars have disk-shaped clouds around them that seem to be solar systems in formation. In 1983, an infrared telescope in space photographed such a disk around Vega, the brightest star in the constellation Lyra. This discovery represented the first direct evidence of such material around any star except the sun. In 1984, astronomers photographed a similar disk around Beta Pictoris, a star in the southern constellation Pictor.
By the early 2000's, astronomers had discovered that more than 50 stars like our sun have planets orbiting them. In almost all cases, they found only one planet per star. All the planets found are probably gaseous with no solid surface.

Why do some astronomers think pluto should not be called a planet?

Most astronomers have been thinking, for a long time, that Pluto was made a planet by mistake.

When it was discovered, it was during a search for a planet. Astronomers were looking for a planet that would be responsible for perturbations in the orbit of Neptune. From the calculations based on the apparent perturbations, astronomers had calculated the characteristics of the body that could cause these perturbations, along with the possible position of this yet-undiscovered planet.

The planet should be a little smaller than Neptune (and bigger than Earth).

When Pluto was finally discovered, it was not in the right place and it appeared a bit too small. Still, it had been found in a famous observatory, funded by a well known American astronomer (who had died not long before: Percival Lovell).

Also, it did look rather bright for the distance, therefore astronomers assumed that it was still a decent size (probably same size as Earth).

So it was declared a planet and given a name as if it were a planet.

However, as time went on, every time astronomers had a chance to measure it, its "upper limit" turned out to be smaller and smaller. ("upper limit" = we do not know its size, but we know that it must be smaller than some limit).

Finally, we now know that it is only 1/6 the size of our Moon (= roughly 1/500 the mass of Earth).

The only reason that it looked so bright is that it is covered in ice (actually, frozen nitrogen), the same as if it were a large comet rather than a small planet. This is a typical case of "appearances are deceiving".

When other similar objects were being discovered by the handful, it was decided to form a new class of planetoids for these (dwarf planets).

This is exactly the same thing as what happened in the late 1850s, early 1860s, when four planets lost their "full fledged" planet status: Ceres, Vesta, Juno and Pallas (they became minor planets, as other similar objects were being discovered by the dozens)