1
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.
Title Page Table of Contents Cool pic Intro to Neptune Pic of Solar System with labels of Outer Planets The Great Dark Spot The Great Dark Spot pic Neptune’s Discovery Solar System pic with Neptune missing Planet X Solar System Pic with ? behind Neptune Jupiter V.s Neptune Pic of Jupiter and Neptune Fun Fact Page Glossary Works Cited About the Author Back summary
2
3
Wind zooming around a blue planet 1,500 miles per hour and the temperature below 0 degrees Fahrenheit. This cold planet is Neptune. Neptune is the last planet from the Sun and Earth. Neptune is also the windiest planet and coldest planet in our solar system. Scientists thought Neptune was there before they had proof or evidence. Neptune is very mysterious and has a cool story.
4
5
Neptune is a very cool planet and one of the most impressive parts of it is The Great Dark Spot. There have been many Great Dark Spots on Neptune and we don’t know how they are caused or why they go away. “This oval-shaped, counterclockwise-spinning "Great Dark Spot" was large enough to contain the entire Earth, and moved westward at nearly 750 mph (1,200 km/h),” said Charles Q. Choi author of Planet Neptune: Facts About Its Orbit, Moons. Neptune is very far away but we know about the Great Dark Spot because a space camera took pictures of Neptune a couple years ago and sent 6 the pictures to NASA.
7
Neptune is very far from the sun and it has an interesting story of discovery. Neptune was first predicted to be there before it was discovered or seen. In 1848, September 23 Neptune was first seen by the French astronomer, Alexis Boulevard. He was studying Uranus, he saw irregularities in its orbit and thought there might be another planet behind Uranus. The German astronomer Johann Galle was the first man to use the calculations to angle a telescope and find Neptune. Charles Q. Choi from Space.com say’s “ Johann Galle then relied on subsequent calculations to help spot Neptune via telescope.”. A while before astronomer Galileo Galle drew Neptune, but mistake it for a star because of Neptune’s slow movement. Neptune is a very different planet and its story of discovery proves it.
8
? 9
Are there planets past Neptune? New evidence shows there might be a large planet past Neptune. Caltech thinks they might have found evidence that there maybe could be a planet after Neptune if there is one it would be around Neptune's size. Caltech scientists are calling it Planet X, and it will be way past Pluto and into deep space, about 20 times farther out than Neptune. Planet X orbit will take about 10,000 - 20,00 Earth years around the Sun. We still don’t know if Planet X exists yet, but if it does it will explain the eerie orbit of a smaller object in the Kuiper Belt. “ If found, the colossal world would represent the first discovery of a planet in our solar system since Pluto in 1930, and before that Neptune in 1846,� says Stuart Clark on The Guardian. The weird object is asteroid is 2015 BP519. The asteroid was discovered 3 yrs ago and It was about 55 times Earth's distance from the sun to us (Earth). Juliette Becker and her team have been tracking it since its discovery, 2015 BP 519 has been following an unusual orbit. That orbit will make more sense if a planet has it in its gravitational pull. The ominous part is that 2015 BP519 is inclined (pulled) to Earth's orbit. So the mystery of asteroid 2015 BP519 is10 still open.
11
Jupiter and Neptune are two very different outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune). The Earth only has one moon and even that is a large amount for inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars). Jupiter has at least 50 known moons and there are probably more still under-discovered, meanwhile, Neptune has around 13 and some still need to get discovered. Jupiter is the biggest planet in our solar system when Neptune is the 4th biggest. Just Jupiter’s radius is 12 times Earth and Neptunes is about 4 times bigger than Earth’s. Neptune has a bigger orbit than Jupiter because it is farther out in the solar system According to Elizabeth Howell from Space.com “ Neptune also has a radius about four times that of Earth's… It has a radius almost 11 times the size of Earth. Jupiter and Neptune have a few similarities such as they both having storms on them ( Jupiter: Great Red Spot and Neptune: Great Dark Spot). Both mainly consist of helium and hydrogen and have larger orbits than the inner planets. As you see Jupiter and Neptune are very different, they still have a few things in common. 12
13
The Methane gas in Neptune's atmosphere creates longer wavelengths and that give Neptune its Brilliant blue color
Neptune's magnetic field is 27 times stronger than Earth's
14
Glossary 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Kuiper Belt = A belt of ice and debris past Neptune Planet = a celestial body moving in an elliptical orbit around a star. the Earth. Proof/Evidence = evidence or argument establishing or helping to establish a fact or the truth of a statement. Predicted = stated or estimated as likely to happen in the future; forecast. Radius = a straight line from the center to the circumference of a circle or sphere. Uranus = the planet before Neptune and after Saturn
15
1.
NASA, NASA, nasaviz.gsfc.nasa.gov/11349.
2.
Choi, Charles Q. “Planet Neptune: Facts About Its Orbit, Moons & Rings.” Space.com, Space.com, 27 Nov. 2017, www.space.com/41-neptune-the-other-blue-planet-in-our-solar-system.html.
3.
Clark, Stuart. “Planet Nine from Outer Space: Is There Another World beyond Neptune?” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 23 May 2018, www.theguardian.com/science/across-the-universe/2018/may/23/planet-nine-from-outer-space-is-there-another-world-be yond-neptune.
4.
Coffey, Jerry. “How Did Neptune Get Its Name?” Universe Today, Universe Today, 6 May 2017, www.universetoday.com/75693/how-did-neptune-get-its-name/.
5.
Howell, Elizabeth. “Gas Giants: Facts About the Outer Planets.” Space.com, Space.com, 30 Mar. 2018, www.space.com/30372-gas-giants.html.
6.
“Planet X.” NASA, NASA, 23 Jan. 2018, solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/hypothetical-planet-x/in-depth/.
16
About the Author Paige VanOsdell was born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina,USA. She is 11 yrs old and has a 2 yr old Australian Shepherd named Sadie. Paige loves to play with her dog and write stories. She goes to Exploris middle school with her older sister.
17
The only planet with winds up to 1,500 miles per hour and an orbit so big that it fits 165 Earth years in one Neptune year. New evidence shows there might be another planet behind Neptune. Neptune is a very mystifying planet!
18