The exam covers Text book (Hartmann & Impey): Pages 228 - 285
The exam consists of 30 Multiple Choice questions.
1) What's weird about Uranus' rotational axis? How are the seasons compared to Earth?
Lecture notes: Page 1 - 18 (Outer Planets & Debris)
You NEED to bring a #2 pencil. We will provide the scanner answer sheets.
2) How where Uranus and Neptune rings discovered? Which planets have ring systems?
3) What is in the atmosphere of U & N? Why are they blue? Why are there no bands on Uranus?
4) What's unique about Miranda? What's unique about Triton? Nereid? Both their orbits?
5) What's the case that Pluto isn't a planet? Why is it not likely an escaped moon of Neptune?
6) What is Charon? What's Pluto's composition? What solar system objects does Pluto resemble?
7) Know a meteor from a meteoroid from a meteorite. What causes us to see a meteor shower?
8) What are the five kinds of meteorites? Which are most common? Where do they come from?
9) What are volatiles? Widmanstatten Patterns? What does it say about the heating history?
10) What IS the asteroid belt? When did it form? Why didn't it form a planet there?
11) Are most asteroids differentiated? Are most Round? What is the total mass of the belt?
12) Why must comets be temporary objects in the inner solar system? What are they made of?
13) What are the two parent sources for comets? Which are long period, which are short?
14) What is the size and distribution of the Oort Cloud? The Kuiper Belt?
15) Have objects been detected in the Oort Cloud? Why/Why not? In the Kuiper Belt?
16) Have comets or asteroids ever hit Earth? How often? Where is the evidence?
17) Which planets have rings? How is Pluto's orbit different from the other Planets?
18) How long did it take for the Planets to form? Why did they form in a flattened disk?
19) If all the planets formed from the solar nebula, why are they so different chemically?
20) What are planetesimals? Planetary Embryos? Which came first? Why do they grow larger?
21) Why did the gas giants get so big? What planet is most like our Sun?
22) What is Beta Pic? What's so important about finding proto-planetary disks?
23) Do planets exist outside our solar system? What are their properties? Why?