Mars and Earth are quite different. Compared to Earth, a year on Mars lasts almost twice as long – 686.98 Earth days. This is due to the fact that Mars is significantly farther from the Sun and its orbital period (the time it takes to orbit the Sun) is significantly greater than that...
Another interesting thing about Saturn is the fact that its axis is tilted off the plane of the ecliptic. Essentially, its orbit is inclined 2.48° relative to the orbital plane of the Earth. Its axis is also tilted by 26.73° relative to the ecliptic of the Sun, which is similar to Ear...
The solar day, by contrast, is the time it takes for the Earth to rotate on its axis so that the sun appears in the same position in the sky. This position changes slightly each day, but on Earth, a mean solar day works out to being 24 hours long. On Mars, a solar day lasts 2...
How long would it take to travel to Mars at the speed of light? The average distance between Earth and Mars the two planets is 140 million miles (225 million km). The distance between the two planets affects how long it would take to travel between the two.(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Cal...
The red planet, and our nearest neighbor, has fascinated stargazers for centuries, but how long does it take for us, and our rovers, to get there?
All the missions were flybys of the planet, meaning that vessels were to orbit Mars to send back images. Those missions were all failures; either the spacecraft didn't make it to the planet or the spacecraft broke apart during the trip. The first successful mission was the 1964 trip by...
How many galaxies has the Hubble Space Telescope spotted? Detecting Distant Galaxies: Galaxies are groupings of stars that can be thousands of light-years in diameter and contain hundreds of billions of stars. Sometimes these galaxies are so far away that they are invisible to the naked eye, ...
Neptune, from about 30 to about 50 times further from the sun than the Earth's orbit. The Oort Cloud is much further away -- about 50,000 times further from the sun than the Earth's orbit. Short period comets come from the Kuiper Belt and long period comets come from the Oort Cloud...
How long is the lunar solar cycle? Early Calendars: Recording the position and phases of the moon and sun helped to create the first calendars in human history. These calendars helped early humans determine when to plant and harvest crops, when to move to a new camp, and make religious pre...
The Sun's influence extends well beyond the orbit of its planets, so we launched spacecraft like the Voyager 1 and 2 probes and NASA's various solar orbiters to study the Sun's effects on the rest of the solar system. Voyagers 1 and 2 are on a one-way trip, sent forth to study ...