Dear MEL Topic Readers,
Seven planets are lining up in the sky next month. This is what it really means
There are eight planets in our solar system. The average distance between the Earth and the Sun is called the Astronomical Unit (AU), which is often used to refer to the distance of other planets from the Sun. The time for our planet to orbit the Sun is 365 days or a year. Here are the distance from the Sun and the time for an orbit of each planet in our solar system.
Mercury 0.39 AU, 88 days
Venus: 0.72 AU, 225 days
Earth: 1.0 AU, 365 days
Mars: 1.52 AU, 687 days
(Asteroid Belt: 2.3-3.2 AU, 3-6 years)
Jupiter: 5.2 AU, 12 years
Saturn: 9.5 AU, 30 years
Uranus: 19 AU, 84 years
Neptune: 30 AU, 164 years
Because of the different orbit speeds, not all the planets are usually on one side of the Sun. But in January and February this year, all the other seven planets are almost lining up and visible, except for Mercury, from our planet. This event is called a planetary parade as planets look like lining up and marching across the night sky. While scientists aren’t sure if such an alignment has any impact on Earth or the Sun, they took advantage of the event in 1977 to conduct a Grant Tour of the outer Solar System, having visited four outermost planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Also, if some intelligence from another solar system observes our planets passing in front of the Sun, called the transit method, they might learn about our solar system.
Read the article and learn about what a planetary parade means to and offers us.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250117-planetary-parade-what-the-alignment-of-seven-planets-really-means-for-science
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