Chapter 11: Planetary Moons and Rings, and Dwarf Planets

Study Plan

For centuries, celestial wonders such as Saturn's rings and the Galilean moons of Jupiter delighted those who looked through telescopes. But with the dawn of the space age, robotic explorers traveling through the Solar System have shown us much more than points of light, revealing wondrous, diverse families of worlds orbiting other planets. Among them we will find

  • Scores of worlds composed of rock and solid ice, some of which formed with their planets and others that were captured later on.
  • Geologically active moons freckled with volcanoes and geysers, and geologically dead moons covered with impact craters.
  • Shattered remains of moons and comets forming the rings that surround each giant planet.
  • Exquisite, delicate structure in ring systems resulting from subtle gravitational interactions among planets, moons, and ring particles.
  • Moons that may harbor deep liquid oceans beneath their ice-covered surfaces and may conceivably provide a home for extraterrestrial life.
  • Two frozen, unexplored worlds, Pluto and Charon, orbiting at the boundary between the inner and outer Solar System.

Organize

  1. Read Chapter 11 in your textbook or ebook.
  2. Take the Diagnostic Quiz to assess your understanding of the basic concepts and identify gaps in your understanding of the assigned reading.

Learn

  1. Use the FlashCards to test your memory for new terms.
  2. Review Extrusions Box 11.1 on Formation of a Large Moon and Box 11.2 on The Backlighting Phenomenon.
  3. If your instructor has assigned SmartWork online homework, login from the right navigation pane for additional practice and review.

Connect

  1. Periodic Connections boxes and the Seeing the Forest through the Trees section at the chapter's end draw your attention to recurring themes and help prepare you for concepts explored more fully in subsequent chapters.
  2. Visit Astronomy in the News for breaking news of new discoveries and the opportunity to apply what you've learned in this chapter to real-world (and real Universe) events.


Section Menu

Organize

Learn

Connect

Norton Gradebook

Instructors now have an easy way to collect students’ online quizzes with the Norton Gradebook without flooding their inboxes with e-mails.

Students can track their online quiz scores by setting up their own Student Gradebook.