Monday, November 16, 2009

5 things about/in the universe

1. The first thing I want to talk about is Saturn's moon Titan, which scientist have already sent the Cassini probe to investigate the moons surface, atmosphere, and composition. The data they received back was phenomenal and unbelievable. They discovered geographic regions very similar to earth such as streams, rivers, mountains and lakes. The surprising thing about these features is that they are not made up of water but liquid nitrogen. Titan's atmosphere also rains liquid nitrogen.





2. The Andromeda Galaxy is the closest spiral galaxy to the Milky Way, it has about 1 trillion stars in it. It is not the closest galaxy though and is apart of our galaxy cluster. It has a couple of red giants in it.





3. Binary star systems, are solar systems that have two stars that affect the planets and other celestrial body's in the solar systems. The larger star is called the primary star and the smaller of the two or more is called the companion.



4.The Asteroid belt is located between Mars and Jupiter, where the majority of our solar system's asteroids are found. There 's more than one asteroid belt in our solar system: the Kuiper belt holds some of the largest asteroids including Quaoar and Ixion being about half the size of Pluto. Many Scientist believe that the asteroid belt is a remnant of a large collision of two planets.

5. The Hubble space telescope was carried into orbit by the space shuttle Discovery. Hubble was the first space telescope ever. It was put into space to provide better, more accurate pictures and measurements. It was successful at this because of the many factors that would've presented an obstacle on Earth are not in space, such as Earth's atmosphere, space dust

Friday, November 13, 2009

IR radiation

1. IR radiation means infrared radiation, which is the heat or thermal radiation from the Sun, that heats the Earth.

2. The three main greenhouse gases are Carbon dioxide, Argon and Water vapor.

3. I kind of think its both a good and a bad, but I'm going to favor bad a little more because with the increase of greenhouse gases; the temperature will also increase globally. This is bad because it causes the ice in the Arctic and Antarctic to melt at fast rates, which will endanger animal species that live in polar regions. Alot of places will receive either less snow or no snow as we're experiencing now.Greenhouse gases also destroy the ozone layer which is very important in blocking out the Sun's UV rays. Thats why i think greenhouse gases are bad.

Condensation and Condensation nuclei

1. one example of condensation is dew on the grass.
The nuclei would be the grass.

2. Blowing your breath on a desk at school, would be condensation because he desk is cooler than your breath.
The desk would be the nuclei.

3. Your car being wet in the morning is an example of condensation.
The car is the nuclei.

4. The mirror, when you take a shower is an example of condensation.
The mirror is the nuclei.

5. The kitchen windows in the morning are an example of condensation.
The windows are the nuclei.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Monsoons

1. A Monsoon is a Seasonal wind that blow steadily from the northeast in the Northern winter and southwest in the Northern summer



2. The two main causes of monsoons are, the movement northward from winter to summer, of the huge upper level subtropical high pressure system known as the Bermuda high and the intense heating of the Mohave desert creates rising air and surface low pressure, called a thermal low.

3. Monsoons can be considered a good thing, because they bring rain to areas, that experience droughts. Monsoons can relieve areas with cool weather, that have been experiencing hot weather.

4.Monsoons are also considered bad, because they can bring droughts, floods and destroy coastal villages or communities.

5. Heavy rains from a Monsoon followed after a drought, which killed 240 people, thousands of cattle and left thousands of people homeless.

6. I personally think that depending on the situation and the lasting affects of a Monsoon, they can be either good or bad. If a Monsoon caused significant flooding or drought than it is bad. If it brings enough rain or give a region some relief from constant rain than it can be good.