14: Cosmic Samples and the Origin of the Solar System

Question 1

randomly occurring meteors not associated with a shower - roughly a half dozen per hour on a clear night

Answer 1

sporadic meteors

Question 2

the gradual accumulation of mass, as by a planet forming from colliding particles in the solar nebula

Answer 2

accretion

Question 3

a planet orbiting a star other than our Sun

Answer 3

exoplanet

Question 4

a meteorite composed primarily of iron and nickel

Answer 4

iron meteorite

Question 5

a small piece of solid matter (typically size of a pea) that enters Earth’s atmosphere and burns up, popularly called a shooting star because it is seen as a small flash of light

Answer 5

meteor

Question 6

many meteors appearing to radiate from one point in the sky; produced when Earth passes through a cometary dust stream

Answer 6

meteor shower

Question 7

a portion of a meteor that survives passage through the atmosphere and strikes the ground

Answer 7

meteorite

Question 8

a meteorite composed mostly of stony material, either primitive or differentiated

Answer 8

stony meteorite

Question 9

a type of differentiated meteorite that is a blend of nickel-iron and silicate materials

Answer 9

stony-iron meteorite

Question 10

much brighter trail created by a meteor the size of a golf ball striking the atmosphere

Answer 10

fireball

Question 11

direction in space from which a stream of meteors appears to be diverging during a meteor shower

Answer 11

radiant

Question 12

spectacular meteor showers associated with the Leonid meteors in 1833 and 1866 - up to 100 meteors observed per second in some locations

Answer 12

meteor storms

Question 13

the age of the Solar System, determined by calculating radioactive ages of meteorites

Answer 13

4.5 billion years

Question 14

meteorites that are fragments of larger, molten parent bodies (from core, mantle, or crust)

Answer 14

differentiated meteorites

Question 15

meteorites derived from asteroids that are made of materials which haven’t been subject to any great heat or pressure since formation - remain same as they were at formation of Solar System

Answer 15

primitive meteorites

Question 16

darkly-colored primitive meteorites that contain carbon and organic materials (building blocks of life)

Answer 16

carbonaceous meteorites

Question 17

restrictions on theories of Solar System formation that must be explained or else a theory will not survive (motion, chemical, and age)

Answer 17

constraints

Question 18

stage following planetesimals, when planets are starting to take shape but “not quite ready for prime time”

Answer 18

protoplanets

Question 19

the larger the planet or moon, the more likely it is to retain its internal heat and the more slowly it cools

Answer 19

baked potato effect