The Belt?

For today's post we are looking at the Asteroid Belt. Do you know where is the asteroid belt. How far is it? How many belts are there? In this post we are answering those questions and giving you information about the asteroid belt. Comment down below what you have learnt. Have a cool day!! Bye!!

The Asteroid Belt
Credits: space-facts.com

The asteroid belt is a ring with dust, rock, asteroids and minor planets that orbits the sun between Mars and Jupiter. The asteroid belt is more than two to three as far from the sun to Earth (AU - Astronomical Units, the distance of the sun and Earth, 93 million miles, 150 million km). In the asteroid belt it contains billions, could be trillions of asteroids. Most of the asteroids are small, the size from a boulder (a rock with a size greater than 25.6 centimetres in diameter) to around 300 metres in diameter. But some are really larger.

The largest asteroid, 4 Vesta

Most of the asteroids in the Asteroid Belt are made out of rock and stone, but there less of iron and nickel metals containing. The other asteroids are made up of mix of carbon-rich materials. Some of the distance asteroids contain more ices. But there is evidence that some asteroids contain water.

Some asteroids are large and hard bodies. There are more than 16 of those in the belt with a diameter greater than 240 km. The largest asteroids, 4 Vesta, 2 Pallas and 10 Hygiea, are 400 km long lore bigger. The largest asteroid, Ceres, a dwarf planet is the diameter of 950 km, or about a quarter of the size of our moon.

The Discovery of the Asteroid Belt

In the 18th century, Johann Titius, a German astronomer, noted a mathematical pattern in the layout of the planets and used it to predict the existence of one between Mars and Jupiter. In 1800, 25 astronomers organised a group known as the Celestial Police, searching 15 degrees of the Zodiac for the missing planet, in the group there was a Italian astronomer Giuseppe Piazzi, he named it Ceres. There was another body found, it was found a year later named Pallas. For sometime, both, Ceres and Pallas were referred as planets. By then the discovery rate of those asteroids increased, by the beginning of the 19th century, more than 100 asteroids had been found. After that, scientists quickly realised that the asteroids were too small to be considered as planets, and they began to call them asteroids. 

What I've learnt?

• Some of the asteroids are made of iron and nickel metal.
• Other asteroids are made out of mix carbon-rich materials.
• There are more than 16 asteroids like 4 Vesta, 2 Pellas, 10 Hygiea etc:
• There are large asteroids like 4 Vesta, 2 Pellas and 10 Hygiea.
• Ceres is the diameter of 950 km and about a quarter of the size of our moon.
• Johann Titius noted a mathematical patter in the layout of the planets.
• Giuseppe Piazzi discovered Ceres and he named it
• Ceres and Pallas was before named as a planet.