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A small orrery showing Earth and the inner planets. An orrery is a mechanical model of the Solar System that illustrates or predicts the relative positions and motions of the planets and moons, usually according to the heliocentric model. It may also represent the relative sizes of these bodies; however, since accurate scaling is often not ...
For example, the model of Jupiter was located in the cavernous South Station waiting area. The properly-scaled, basket-ball-sized model is 1.3 miles (2.14 km) from the model Sun which is located at the museum, graphically illustrating the immense empty space in the Solar System. The objects in such large models do not move.
In astronomy, coordinate systems are used for specifying positions of celestial objects (satellites, planets, stars, galaxies, etc.) relative to a given reference frame, based on physical reference points available to a situated observer (e.g. the true horizon and north to an observer on Earth's surface). [1]
A numerical model of the Solar System is a set of mathematical equations, which, when solved, give the approximate positions of the planets as a function of time. Attempts to create such a model established the more general field of celestial mechanics. The results of this simulation can be compared with past measurements to check for accuracy ...
The models consist of numeric representations of positions, velocities and accelerations of major Solar System bodies, tabulated at equally spaced intervals of time, covering a specified span of years. [1] Barycentric rectangular coordinates of the Sun, eight major planets and Pluto, and geocentric coordinates of the Moon are tabulated.
Solar System space probes operational as of November 2024. This is a list of active space probes which have escaped Earth orbit. It includes lunar space probes, but does not include space probes orbiting at the Sun–Earth Lagrangian points (for these, see List of objects at Lagrangian points). A craft is deemed "active" if it is still able to ...
A disk of hot gas swirls around a black hole in this illustration. The stream of gas stretching to the right is what remains of a star that was pulled apart by the black hole.
It was created in 2000 by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) to be the global standard reference system for objects located outside the gravitational vicinity of Earth: [1] planets, moons, and other Solar System bodies, stars and other objects in the Milky Way galaxy, and extra-galactic objects.