As promised, I have compiled videos that could help you visually with your second preliminary group activity: The Planets of Our Solar System. Here's an overview tour of own star system:
Here are the lengthy videos each could watch regarding the planet they are assigned wit.
VENUS & MERCURY - A Traveler's Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
MARS - A Traveler's Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
JUPITER - A Travelers' Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
SATURN - A Traveler's Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
NEPTUNE & URANUS - A Traveler's Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
PLUTO AND BEYOND - A Traveler's Guide to the Planets | Full Documentary
Pluto is not included in the major planets of our Solar System, however, you might want to watch the following documentary:
The learners shall be able to understand the subsystems
(geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere) that make up the
Earth.
Learning Competencies
The learners shall be able to
1.recognize the uniqueness of Earth,
being the only planet in the solar system with properties necessary to support life (S11/12ES-Ia-e-3).
2.explain that the Earth consists of
four subsystems, across whose boundaries matter and energy flow (S11/12ES-Ia-e-4)
3.show the contributions of
personalities/people on the understanding of Earth Systems (S11/12ES-Ia-e-6).
3.
Specific Learning Outcomes
At the end of this lesson, the learners will be able to:
1.Recognize the difference in the
physical and chemical properties between the Earth and its neighboring planes;
and
2.Identify the factors that allow a
planet to support life.
3.Define the concept of a system;
4.Recognize the Earth as a system
composed of subsystems; and
5.Discuss the historical development of
the concept of Earth System.
Life of
Earth
Earth is the only habitable planet in our
solar system due to the following:
1.Existence
of Liquid wate
a.may
originate from volcanism or from icy meteors from space;
b.water
exists in three (3) phases on earth – liquid, solid (ice) and gas (water vapor)
2.Atmosphere
a.Gravity is
responsible for having atmosphere
b.Traps
certain amount of heat from the sun to warm the earth (greenhouse effect)
c.Protects
the earth from too much radiation from the sun
3.Heat
Source
a.Radiogenic
heat – comes from the earth’s core – a thermonuclear reactor
b.Sunlight –
another source of heath from the sun
Goldilocks
Zone
The habitable zone is the belt around a star
where temperatures are ideal for liquid water -- an essential ingredient for
life as we know it -- to pool on a planet's surface. Earth lies within the
habitable zone of our star, the sun. Beyond this zone, a planet would probably
be too cold and frozen for life (though it's possible life could be buried
underneath a moon's surface). A planet lying between a star and the habitable
zone would likely be too hot and steamy.
NASA's Kepler mission is helping scientists in
the quest to find these worlds, sometimes called Goldilocks planets after the
fairy tale because they orbit where conditions are "just right" for
life. Kepler and other telescopes have confirmed a handful so far, all of which
are a bit larger than Earth -- the Super Earths. The search for Earth's twin, a
habitable-zone planet as small as Earth, is ongoing.
Earth
Subsystems
1.Definition
of a System -A set of interconnected
components that are interacting to form a unified whole.
2.Components
or subsystems of the Earth System.
3.Earth
system is essentially a closed system.It receives energy from the sun andreturns some of this energy to space.
1.Atmosphere.
A.The
atmosphere is the thin gaseous layer that envelopes the lithosphere.
B.The
present atmosphere is composed of 78% nitrogen (N), 21% oxygen (O2), 0.9%
argon, and trace amount of other gases.
C.One of the
most important processes by which the heat on the Earth's surface is redistributed is through atmospheric
circulation.
D.There is
also a constant exchange of heat and moisture between the atmosphere and the
hydrosphere through the hydrologic cycle.
2.Geosphere (Lithosphere).
A.The geosphere or lithosphere includes the rocks of
the crust and mantle, the metallic liquid outer core, and the solid metallic
inner core.
B.Plate
Tectonics - an
important process shaping the surface of the Earth. The primary driving mechanism is the Earth's
internal heat, such as that in mantle convection.
3.Biosphere.
A.The
biosphere is the set of all life forms on Earth.
B.It covers
all ecosystems—from the soil to the rainforest, from mangroves to coral
reefs,
and from the plankton-rich ocean surface to the deep sea.
C.For the
majority of life on Earth, the base of the food chain comprises
photosynthetic organisms.
D.During
photosynthesis, CO2 is sequestered from
the atmosphere, while oxygen is released
as a byproduct. The biosphere is a CO2 sink, and therefore, an important part
of the carbon cycle.
4.Hydrosphere.
A.About 70%
of the Earth is covered with liquid water (hydrosphere) and much of it is in
the form of ocean water (Figure 3).
B.Only 3% of
Earth's water is fresh: two-thirds are in the form of ice (cryosphere), and the remaining
C.one-third
is present in streams, lakes, and groundwater.
D.The oceans
are important sinks for CO2 through direct exchange with the atmosphere and
E.indirectly
through the weathering of rocks.
F.Heat is
absorbed and redistributed on the surface of the Earth through ocean circulation.
5.The origin
of the systems approach to the study of
the Earth
A.One of the
first scientist to push for a more integrated or holistic approach in the
understanding of the universe (and by extension the Earth) was Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander
von Humboldt. He considered the universe
as one interacting entity.
B.The term
"biosphere" was
popularized by Vladimir Vernadsky
(1863-1945), a Russian - Ukranian scientist who hypothesized that life is a
geological force that shapes the Earth.
C.In the
1970s, the Gaia Hypothesis was
jointly developed by James Lovelock,
an English scientist/naturalist, and Lynn
Margulis, an American microbiologist.
According to the Gaia Hypothesis.
the biosphere is a self-regulating system that is capable of controlling
its physical and chemical environment.
D.In 1983,
NASA advisory council established the Earth
Systems Science Committee. The
committee, chaired by Moustafa Chahine,
published a ground breaking report Earth System Science: A Program For Global
Change in 1988. For the first time,
scientist were able to demonstrate how the many systems interact.
Alternative Learning Resources
Watch the following Youtube videos:
The learners demonstrate an understanding of the formation of the universe and the solar system.
Learning Competencies
The learners shall be able to describe the different hypotheses explaining the origin of the solar system (S11/12ES-Ia-e-2) and explain the current advancements/information on the solar system (S11/12ES-Ia-e-5)
Specific Learning Outcomes
At the end of this lesson, the learners will be able to:
Identify the large scale and small scale properties of the Solar System;
Discuss the different hypotheses explaining the origin of the solar system; and
Become familiar with the most recent advancements/information on the solar system.
Solar System
Overview
The solar system is located in the Milky Way
galaxya huge disc- and spiral-shaped aggregation of about at least 100 billion
stars and other bodies;
Its spiral arms rotate around a globular cluster
or bulge of many, many stars, at the center of which lies a supermassive black
hole;
This galaxy is about 100 million light years
across (1 light year = 9.4607 × 10^12 km);
The solar system revolves around the galactic
center once in about 240 million years;
The Milky Way is part of the so-called Local
Group of galaxies, which in turn is part of the Virgo super cluster of
galaxies;
Based on on the assumption that they are
remnants of the materials from which they were formed, radioactive dating of
meteorites, suggests that the Earth and solar system are 4.6 billion years old
on the assumption that they are remnants of the materials from which they were
formed.
Large Scale Features of the Solar System
1.Much of the mass of the Solar System isconcentrated at the center (Sun)while angular momentum is held by the outer
planets.
2.Orbits of the planets elliptical and are onthe same plane.
3.All planets revolve around the sun.
4.The periods of revolution of the planets
increase with increasing distance from the Sun; the innermost planet moves
fastest, the outermost, the slowest;
5.All planets are located at regular intervals
from the Sun.
Small scale features of the Solar System
1.Most planets rotate prograde
2.Inner terrestrial planets are made of materials
with high melting points such as silicates, iron , and nickel. They rotate slower,
have thin or no atmosphere, higher densities, and lower contents ofvolatiles - hydrogen, helium, and noble
gases.
3.The outer four planets - Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus
andNeptune are called "gas
giants" because of the dominance of gases and their larger size.They rotate faster, have thick atmosphere,
lower densities, and fluid interiors rich in hydrogen, helium and ices (water,
ammonia, methane).
Element Abundance on Earth, Meteorites, and
Universe
A.Except for hydrogen, helium, inert gases, and
volatiles, the universe and Earth have similar abundance especially for rock
and metal elements.
B.The sun and the large planets have enough
gravity to retain hydrogen and helium. Rare inert gases are too light for the
Earth’s gravity to retain, thus the low abundance.
C.Retention of volatile elements by the Earth is
consistent with the idea that some materials that formed the Earth and the
solar system were “cold” and solid; otherwise, the volatiles would have been
lost. These suggest that the Earth and the solar system could be derived from
materials with composition similar to that of the universe.
D.The presence of heavy elements such as lead,
silver, and uranium on Earth suggests that it was derived from remnants of a
supernova and that the Sun is a second-generation star made by recycling
materials.
Abundance of elements
Earth’s origins known mainly from its compositional differences with
the entire Universe. Planet-making process modified original cosmic material.
Origin of the Solar System
Any acceptable scientific thought on the origin of the solar system
has to be consistent with and supported by information about it (e.g.large and small scale features,
composition).There will be a need to revise
currently accepted ideas should data no longer support them.
Rival Theories
Many theories have been proposed since about four centuries ago. Each
has weaknesses in explaining all characteristics of the solar system.
Nebular Hypothesis
In the 1700s Emanuel Swedenborg, Immanuel Kant, and Pierre-Simon
Laplace independently thought of a rotating
gaseous cloud that cools and contracts in the middle to form the sun and
the rest into a disc that become the planets. This nebular theory failed to
account for the distribution of angular momentum in the solar system.
Encounter Hypotheses:
A.Buffon’s (1749) Sun-comet encounter that sent
matter to form planet;
B.James Jeans’ (1917) sun-star encounter that
would have drawn from the sun matter that would condense to planets,
C.T.C. Chamberlain and F. R. Moulton’s (1904)
planetesimal hypothesis involving a star much bigger than the Sun passing by
the Sun and draws gaseous filaments from both out which planetisimals were
formed;
D.Ray Lyttleton’s(1940) sun’s companion star
colliding with another to form a proto-planet that breaks up to form Jupiter
and Saturn.
E.Otto Schmidt’s accretion theory proposed that
the Sun passed through a dense interstellar cloud and emerged with a dusty,
gaseous envelope that eventually became the planets. However, it cannot explain
how the planets and satellites were formed. The time required to form the
planets exceeds the age of the solar system.
F.M.M. Woolfson’s capture theory is a variation of
James Jeans’ near-collision hypothesis. In this scenario, the Sun drags from a
near proto-star a filament of material which becomes the planets. Collisions
between proto-planets close to the Sun produced the terrestrial planets;
condensations in the filament produced the giant planets and their satellites.
Different ages for the Sun and planets is predicted by this theory.
Sun - Star interaction
Nobel Prize winner Harold Urey’s compositional studies on meteorites
in the 1950s and other scientists’ work on these objects led to the conclusion
that meteorite constituents have changed
very little since the solar system’s early history and can give clues about
their formation. The currently accepted theory on the origin of the solar
system relies much on information from meteorites.
Protoplanet Hypothesis -
Current Hypothesis
A.About 4.6 billion years ago, in the Orion arm of
the Milky Way galaxy, a slowly-rotating gas and dust cloud dominated by
hydrogen and helium starts to contract due to gravity
B.As most of the mass move to the center to
eventually become a proto-Sun, the remaining materials form a disc that will
eventually become the planets and momentum is transferred outwards.
C.Due to collisions, fragments of dust and solid
matter begin sticking to each other to form larger and larger bodies from meter
to kilometer in size. These proto-planets are accretions of frozen water,
ammonia, methane, silicon, aluminum, iron, and other metals in rock and mineral
grains enveloped in hydrogen and helium.
D.High-speed collisions with large objects
destroys much of the mantle of Mercury, puts Venus in retrograde rotation.
E.Collision of the Earth with large object
produces the moon. This is supported by the composition of the moonvery similar to the Earth's Mantle
F.When the proto-Sun is established as a star, its
solar wind blasts hydrogen, helium, and volatiles from the inner planets to
beyond Mars to form the gas giants leaving behind a system we know today.
Recent advancement/information
on the Solar System
·Exploration
of Mars
Since the 1960s, the Soviet
Union and the U.S. have been sending unmanned probes to the planet Mars with
the primary purpose of testing the planet's habitability.The early efforts in the exploration of Mars
involved flybys through which spectacular photographs of the Martian surface
were taken.The first successful landing
and operation on the surface of Mars occurred in 1975 under the Viking program
of NASA.Recently, NASA, using high
resolution imagery of the surface of Mars, presented evidence of seasonal flow
liquid water (in the form of brine - salty water) on the surface of Mars.
Rosetta's
Comet
Rosetta is a space probe built
by the European Space Agency and launched on 2 March 2004.One of its mission is to rendezvous with and
attempt to land a probe (Philae) on a comet in the Kuiper Belt.One of the purpose of the mission is to
better understand comets and the early solar systems. Philae landed
successfully on comet (67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko) on 12 November 2014.Analysis of the water (ice) from the comet
suggest that its isotopic composition is different from water from Earth
·Pluto
Flyby
On 14 July 2015,NASA's New Horizon spacecraft provided
mankind the first close-up view of the dwarf planet Pluto.Images captured from the flyby revealed a
complex terrain - ice mountains and vast crater free plains. The presence of
crater free plains suggests recent (last 100 millions of years) of geologic
activity.
