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Confusing definitions in Astronomy

Follow Sep 04, 2019 · 1 min read
Confusing definitions in Astronomy
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METEOR:

A meteor is a piece of rock that burns up in the atmosphere as it streaks across the sky.The tails of meteors,which point away from the direction of motion,are caused by air friction.On a clear night,you might see a meteor every few minutes simply by gazing upward.

METEORITES:

A rock that actually land on Earth is called a meteorite.

ASTEROIDS:

Asteroids are rocky debris in the solar system.Most of them are are contained in the asteroid belt and are remnants of a failed planet between Mars and Jupiter.If you were to add up the masses of all the known asteroids,the sum would only amount to 4 percent of the mass of the moon.For the most part,asteroids remain in stable orbits in the asteroid belt,but occasionally one strays and hits the Earth’s atmosphere and burns up as a meteor.

COMET:

A comet is a piece of ice and rock that originates far beyond the orbit of the Earth.While asteroids lie within the solar system,many comets actually orbit in the outer fringes of the solar system,in the Kuiper Belt,or even outside the solar system itself,in the Oort Cloud.The comets we see in the night sky are those whose orbit or trajectory had brought them near the Sun🌞🚀

Ref:Mining the Heavens p-55-71,The Future of Humanity by Michio Kaku

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