2. Discovery
Uranus became the first planet discovered with a
telescope.
The discoverer was William Herschel, March 13th
1781.
At the beginning, Herschel thought it was a
comet, but several years later it was confirmed as
a planet.
3. Name
Herschel wanted to
name his discovery
“Georgian Sidus” after
the reign of King
George III.
The name “Uranus” was
proposed by astronomer
Johann Bode. The
name comes from the
ancient Greek deity
Ouranos.
4. Location
Uranus is the seventh planet in our solar system.
It's the third biggest, but it isn't visible to the naked
eye.
5. Orbit and rotation
Uranus turns round the sun every 84 Earth years.
The distance from the Sun is about 3,000 million
km (about 20 AU).
The interior rotational period of Uranus is 17
hours and 14 minutes.
However, like all giant planets, the upper
atmosphere has very strong winds in the direction
of rotation. In fact, in some latitudes, the features
of the atmosphere move much faster, making a
full rotation in a short time.
6. Orbit and rotation
During some parts of its orbit one or the other of
its poles point directly at the Sun and get about 42
years of direct sunlight. The rest of the time they
are in darkness.
7. Inclination of its axis
This planet is very
curious because it
revolve around the sun,
sideway.
Uranus tipped over on its
side with an axial tilt of
98 degrees.
We don't know why, but
astronomers say that a
meteorite hit its rings and
it deflected the orbit of
Uranus
8. Features
●Mass: 86,810,300,000,000,000 billion kg. It's
like 14.54 Earths.
●Diameter: 51,118 km.
●Gravity: 8.69 m/s²
● Average surface
Temperature:- 224ºC
9. Composition
This planet is often called “ice giant” planet
because it has:
- Outer Atmosphere, it's the cloud layer.
- Atmosphere with hydrogen, helium and methane
- Mantle with water, ammonia and methane ice
- Rocky and ice core
The methane ice crystals give the planet its
greenish-blue color.
10. Moons
Uranus has 27 known moons and others notable
moons like Titania, Oberon, Miranda, Ariel. The
most interesting Uranus' moon is Miranda
because it has strange-looking surface areas like
ice canyons, terraces, and others.
These moons are named after characters created
by W. Shakespeare and A. Pope. All of them are
frozen worlds with dark surfaces. Some are
mixtures of rock and ice.
11. Rings
Uranus has 13 known rings. They are divide in
two sets of rings. The sets are very thin and dark
colored.The ring's particles are small.
There are nine inner rings and two outer rings.
They probably formed when one or more of
Uranus’ moons were broken up in an impact. The
first set of rings was discovered in 1977 and the
second set was discovered in 2003.
