Uranus-The Planet

The Seventh Planet Uranus

How was it discovered?

The planet Uranus was discovered by William Herschel on March 13, 1781. He discovered Uranus while surveying stars in the night sky using a telescope that he had built himself. Herschel noticed that one of these "stars" seemed different, and after observing it many more times, noticed that it orbited the Sun. He calculated that Uranus had an orbit that was about 18 times farther from the Sun than Earth.

Rotation Period Of Uranus

One day on Uranus takes about 17 hours. Uranus makes a complete orbit around the Sun in about 84 Earth years. Uranus is the only planet whose equator is nearly at a right angle to its orbit, with a tilt of 97.77 degrees—possibly the result of a collision with an Earth-sized object long ago. This unique tilt causes the most extreme seasons in the solar system. For nearly a quarter of each Uranian year, the Sun shines directly over each pole, plunging the other half of the planet into a 21-year-long, dark winter. Uranus is also one of just two planets that rotate in the opposite direction than most of the planets from east to west.

Formation

Uranus took shape when the rest of the solar system formed about 4.5 billion years ago, when gravity pulled swirling gas and dust in to become this ice giant. Like its neighbor Neptune, Uranus likely formed closer to the Sun and moved to the outer solar system about 4 billion years ago, where it is the seventh planet from the Sun.

Surface

As an ice giant, Uranus doesn't have a true surface. The planet is mostly swirling fluids. While a spacecraft would have nowhere to land on Uranus, it wouldn't be able to fly through its atmosphere unscathed either. The extreme pressures and temperatures would destroy a metal spacecraft.

Magnetosphere

Uranus has an unusual, irregularly shaped magnetosphere. Magnetic fields are typically in alignment with a planet's rotation, but Uranus' magnetic field is tipped over: the magnetic axis is tilted nearly 60 degrees from the planet's axis of rotation, and is also offset from the center of the planet by one-third of the planet's radius.

Auroras on Uranus are not in line with the poles (like they are on Earth, Jupiter and Saturn) due to the lopsided magnetic field.

The magnetosphere tail behind Uranus opposite the Sun extends into space for millions of miles. Its magnetic field lines are twisted by Uranus' sideways rotation into a long corkscrew shape.

Uranus is often referred as ice giant planet

An ice giant is a giant planet composed mainly ofices—volatile substances heavier than hydrogen and helium, such as water,methane, and ammonia—as opposed to gas (hydrogen and helium).It became known in the 1990s that Uranus and Neptunewere really a distinct class of giant planet, composed of about 20% hydrogen,compared to the heavier gas giants' 90%. These materials were actually icesduring the ice giants' formation, but now they exist in different phases,primarily super-critical fluids.The ice is primarily H2O. Ice giants arethought to lack metallic hydrogen at their cores, unlike the gasgiants. Different atmospheric patterns have been observed, including polarvortices, strong zonal winds, and large-scale circulation. Here it rainsdiamond just as Neptune.

Spaceship flown over Uranus

Uranus approach. NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft flew closely past distant Uranus, the seventh planet from the Sun, in January 1986. At its closest, the spacecraft came within 81,500 kilometers (50,600 miles) of Uranus's cloud tops on Jan. 24, 1986.

Moons of Uranus

Voyager 2 discovered 10 more moons in 1986, bringing the total to 15.Since then scientists using the Hubble Space Telescope and powerful Earth-based telescopes have continued to discover more moons orbiting Uranus. In 1997, two moons [Uranus XVI (Caliban) and XVII (Sycorax)] were discovered using the 200-inch Hale telescope at the Palomar Observatory in California, USA. In 1999, another three moons were discovered: one was discovered while comparing images from Voyager 2 and two more were discovered by astronomers using the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope at Mauna Kea. As of 2014, 27 moons are known to orbit Uranus.

Rings Of Uranus

The rings of Uranus are a system of around the planet , intermediate in complexity between the more extensive set around and the simpler systems around and . The rings of Uranus were discovered on March 10, 1977, by , Edward W. Dunham, and . had also reported observing rings in 1789; modern astronomers are divided on whether he could have seen them, as they are very dark and faint