Our universe and her near neighbours

Let’s take a look at the planet earth’s Polar Regions where the global warming is currently melting down thousands of ice blocks and increasing the volume of liquid water on the earth surface. Polar Regions receive less intensive solar radiation because the sun’s energy arrives at an oblique angle, spreading over a larger area, and also travels a longer distance through the Earth’s atmosphere in which it may be absorbed, scattered or reflected, which is the same thing that causes winters to be colder than the rest of the year in temperate areas. The axial tilt of the Earth has a major effect on climate of the Polar Regions. Since the Polar Regions are the farthest from the equator, they receive the least amount of sunlight and are therefore frigid. The large amount of ice and snow also reflects a large part of what little sunlight the Polar Regions receive, contributing to the cold. Polar regions are characterized by the polar climate, extremely cold temperatures, heavy glaciations wherever there is sufficient precipitation to form permanent ice, and extreme variations in daylight hours, with twenty-four hours of daylight in summer, and complete darkness at mid-winter. It’s not the planet earth that has Polar Regions but also all other planets have got their own polar regions including our moon which is not a planet but the earth’s moon and regarded as the biggest earth’s satellite. Other planets have got their moon or moons because some planets have many moons. The photo below is one of North Polar Region’s photos with the ice sheets. What about the moon? The Earth may only have one Moon, but it’s a big one. The Earth’s Moon is the fifth largest in the whole solar system. But it is still smaller than the Earth, so objects weigh less on the Moon than they do here. That’s why the astronauts could enjoy bouncing around on the lunar surface. Even though the Moon has no liquid water, it does have special “seas” and “land” on its surface. There are also many interesting features such as craters, mountain ranges, and lava plains. The interior of the Moon is made up of different layers of rock, some solid and some molten like lava. The footprints left behind by the Apollo astronauts will last for many thousands of years because there is no wind on the Moon. The Moon has no atmosphere, so there is no weather to erase the footprints. On the Earth, the atmosphere acts as a blanket, keeping the warmth of the Sun in even at night. Because there is no atmosphere on the Moon, the temperatures there are very hot during the day (100 ° C) and very cold at night (-173 ° C). The Moon doesn’t produce its own light, but looks bright because it reflects light from the Sun. Think of the Sun as a light bulb, and the Moon as a mirror, reflecting light from the light bulb. The lunar phase changes as the Moon orbits the Earth and different portions of its surface are illuminated by the Sun. The Moon takes about 27 days (27 days, 7 hours, 43 minutes, 11.6 seconds) to go all the way around the Earth and return to its starting position. A lunar month is the time the moon takes to pass through a complete cycle of its phases and is measured from New Moon to New Moon. A lunar month is about 29.5 days (29 days, 12 hours, 43 minutes, 11.6 seconds). Whilst the Moon is orbiting the Earth, the Earth is constantly moving because it is orbiting the sun. The Moon therefore travels slightly more than 360° to get from one new moon to the next. Thus the lunar month is longer. The Moon is 4.5 billion years old. The Moon is about 250,000 miles (384,400 kilometres) from Earth. Travelling by car:Travelling by rocket:Travelling by light speed: 130 days13 hours1.52 sec The moon orbits Earth at a speed of 2,288 miles per hour (3,683 kilometres per hour). The surface of the moon has many things on it such as craters, lava plains, mountains, and valleys. Scientists believe the craters were formed around 3.5 to 4.5 billion years ago by meteors hitting the moon’s surface. (Meteors or “shooting stars” are space particles that have either been left behind by comets, or broken off from asteroids. Meteors orbiting the Sun are called meteoroids and are made of rocks and chunks of metal like iron and nickel. Asteroids are tiny rocky planets that orbit the Sun. They can be as small as 1 kilometre (km) across or as large as 700 km. There are thousands of asteroids in our Solar System. Most of them can be found in an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter). There is no wind or weather on the moon.The footprints left there by the Apollo astronauts will remain there for millions of years because of this. The moon has no light source; it only reflects light from the sun to the earth.The Moon s The Moon has e Moon has Water was discovered on the moon in November 2009 The moon causes many of the tides in the Earth’s oceans. This is because of the gravity force between the Earth and Moon. At full Moon and new Moon, the Sun, Earth and Moon are lined up, producing the higher than normal tides (called spring tides, for the way they spring up). When the Moon is at first or last quarter, smaller neap tides form. The moon has been a mystery to man for centuries. Thankfully, in more recent years, we have had the ability to explore this vast world of huge mountain peaks, enormous valleys, and gigantic craters that satellites our planet. The moon which measures 3,476 km, is about ¼ the size of Earth. In comparison to the largest moon in our solar system, Ganymede, which orbits Jupiter and has a diameter of 5,262 km, and the smallest major moon in our solar system, Miranda, which orbits Uranus and has a diameter of 472 km, our moon is considered to be rather large. It takes 27 1/3 days for the moon to fully orbit the Earth’s barycenter (center of gravity), and contrary to popular belief, it rotates in an elliptical orbit, not circular. It has a diameter of 3,476 km, over a quarter the size of the Earth’s diameter, and a mass of 7.3483 × 1022 kg, as compared with a figure roughly 81 times larger for the Earth. calebnda1@yahoo.com