Solar System Exploration: Solar System 101: Homework Helper

HOMEWORK HELPER

Far, Far Away
Our star and its planets are a tiny part of the Milky Way galaxy. The Milky Way is a huge city of stars, so big that even at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to cross it. All the stars in the night sky, including our sun, are just some of the residents of this galaxy. Beyond our own galaxy lies a vast expanse of galaxies.

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Don't Wait Up Even though it is speeding along at more than 60 thousand kph (39 thousand mph), it will take Voyager 2 more than 296 thousand years to pass Sirius, the brightest star in our night sky.

Plethora of Planets Before 1994, only the planets of our solar system were known to exist. Today, Kepler scientists have discovered more than 100 confirmed planets orbiting distant stars.

Big Neighborhood The nearest star to our sun -- Proxima Centauri -- is more than 39.9 trillion km (24.8 trillion miles) away. It takes the light from this dim star more than four years to reach Earth.

Big Place There are billions of stars and countless solar systems in our galaxy.

Milky Way The Milky Way is a huge city of stars, so big that even at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to travel across it.

There's a Great Big Universe Out There Beyond our own galaxy lies a vast expanse of galaxies. The deeper we see into space, the more galaxies we discover. There are billions of galaxies, the most distant of which are so far away that the light arriving from them on Earth today set out from the galaxies billions of years ago. So we see them not as they are today, but as they looked long before there was any life on Earth.

Don't Wait Up Even though it is speeding along at more than 60 thousand kph (39 thousand mph), it will take Voyager 2 more than 296 thousand years to pass Sirius, the brightest star in our night sky.

Plethora of Planets Before 1994, only the planets of our solar system were known to exist. Today, Kepler scientists have discovered more than 100 confirmed planets orbiting distant stars.

Big Neighborhood The nearest star to our sun -- Proxima Centauri -- is more than 39.9 trillion km (24.8 trillion miles) away. It takes the light from this dim star more than four years to reach Earth.

Big Place There are billions of stars and countless solar systems in our galaxy.

Milky Way The Milky Way is a huge city of stars, so big that even at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to travel across it.

There's a Great Big Universe Out There Beyond our own galaxy lies a vast expanse of galaxies. The deeper we see into space, the more galaxies we discover. There are billions of galaxies, the most distant of which are so far away that the light arriving from them on Earth today set out from the galaxies billions of years ago. So we see them not as they are today, but as they looked long before there was any life on Earth.