Understanding Our Universe
3rd Edition
ISBN: 9780393614428
Author: PALEN, Stacy, Kay, Laura, Blumenthal, George (george Ray)
Publisher: W.w. Norton & Company,
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Chapter 9, Problem 42QAP
To determine
The size of a cubic volume of comet tail material.
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The mass of an average comet's nucleus is about 1.0 x 1014 kg. If the Oort cloud contains 2.0 x 1011 comet nuclei, what is the mass of the cloud in units of Earth masses? (Note: Earth's mass is 5.97 x 1024
kg.)
Compare that with Saturn's mass. (Note: Saturn's mass in units of Earth's mass is 95.2 M)
mass of the Oort cloud
mass of Saturn
The mass of an average comet's nucleus is about 1.0 ✕ 1014 kg. If the Oort cloud contains 2.0 ✕ 1011 comet nuclei, what is the mass of the cloud in units of Earth masses? (Note: Earth's mass is 5.97 ✕ 1024 kg.)________ m
Compare that with Uranus's mass. (Note: Uranus's mass in units of Earth's mass is 14.5 M.)
mass of the Oort Cloud / mas of Uranus =________
A comet’s perihelion distance is 1 AU, and its aphelion distance is 15 AU. In the following, we make a very crude calculation of the average rate of shrinkage of the comet.(a) Calculate the comet’s orbital period.(b) Estimate how many meters of ice the comet will lose each time it orbits the Sun. (Hint: To simplify the calculations, you may assume that ice sublimates off the comet’s surface during one tenth of its orbital period, that the average cometary distance over that period is 1.5 AU and the density of the cometary ice is 600 kg m−3.)
Chapter 9 Solutions
Understanding Our Universe
Ch. 9.1 - Prob. 9.1CYUCh. 9.2 - Prob. 9.2CYUCh. 9.3 - Prob. 9.3CYUCh. 9.4 - Prob. 9.4CYUCh. 9.5 - Prob. 9.5CYUCh. 9.6 - Prob. 9.6CYUCh. 9 - Prob. 1QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 2QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 3QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 4QAP
Ch. 9 - Prob. 5QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 6QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 7QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 8QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 9QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 10QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 11QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 12QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 13QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 14QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 15QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 16QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 17QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 18QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 19QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 20QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 21QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 22QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 23QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 24QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 25QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 26QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 27QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 28QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 29QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 30QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 31QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 32QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 33QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 34QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 35QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 36QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 37QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 38QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 39QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 40QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 41QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 42QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 43QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 44QAPCh. 9 - Prob. 45QAP
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- The Tunguska asteroid is estimated to have had a diameter of 50 m, and to have produced an explosion equivalent to 10 megatons of TNT (1 megaton = 4.2 x 1015 joules). Assume that the asteroid was a sphere with density 2 g/cm3. Using the kinetic energy formula K = ½ mv2, where m is the mass and v is the speed, to estimate the speed of the asteroid. Assume that all kinetic energy is converted into the energy of the explosion. Give your answer in km/s with one significant figure.arrow_forwardIf the velocity of the solar wind is about 4.0 102 km/s and the visible tail of a comet is 1.0 108 km long, how many days does an atom in the solar wind take to travel from the nucleus to the end of the visible tail? (Nate: 1 day = 86,400 seconds.)arrow_forwardThe mass of the planet is approximately 74.8 times the mass of Jupiter. Calculate the average density of the planet. Give your answer in grams per cubic centimeter.arrow_forward
- Calculate the orbital period of a comet nucleus in the Oort cloud.arrow_forwardA crater on the Moon is 28 km in diameter. If a typical meteorite is 11 times smaller than the diameter of the crater, what was the diameter (in km) of the original meteorite? km What is the estimated depth (in km) of the crater if its depth is one-ninth its diameter? kmarrow_forwardA typical comet contains some 1013 kg of water ice. How many comets would have to strike Earth in order to account for the roughly 2×1021 kg of water presently found on our planet? (Hint: simple division) If this amount of water accumulated over a period of 500 million years, how frequently must Earth have been hit by comets during that time? (Hint: Calculate, on the average, how many comets hit the Earth per year during that time.)arrow_forward
- A comet with a 2km diameter will make a crater about 20 km in diameter. If the comet has a mass of 4.5 x1012kg and impacts the surface at 35 km/sec, what is the kinetic energy of the comet in Joules?arrow_forwardWhy is the composition of a comet typically dominated by volatile materials (frozen ices)? choose one of the following: a. rock and metal could not condense out of the solar nebula at extreme distances from the sun b. most of the metal in the solar system is locked up inside the terrestrial planets c. metals are not stable in the outer solar system d. elements that form ices (as opposed to rock & metals) are more abundant in our solar systemarrow_forwardA lot of asteroid and comet dust collides with Earth's atmosphere everyday. Assume that 500 tons of mass is added to Earth daily from the millions of meteors that enter our atmosphere. Estimate the time it would take for the Earth's mass to increase 0.2% with this impact rate. Is this mass accumulation significant to Earth as a planet.arrow_forward
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