Thursday 13 March 2008

Answers to "Uranus".....


March 13, 1781


William Hershel discovers Uranus !!!

The German-born English astronomer William Hershel discovers Uranus, the seventh planet from the sun. Herschel's discovery of a new planet was the first to be made in modern times, and also the first to be made by use of a telescope, which allowed Herschel to distinguish Uranus as a planet, not a star, as previous astronomers believed.

Herschel, who was later knighted for his historic discovery, named the planet Georgium Sidus, or the "Georgian Planet," in honor of King George III of England. However, German astronomer Johann Bode proposed the name "Uranus" for the celestial body in order to conform to the classical mythology-derived names of other known planets. Uranus, the ancient Greek deity of the heavens, was a predecessor of the Olympian gods. By the mid-19th century, it was also the generally accepted name of the seventh planet from the sun.

The planet Uranus is a gas giant like Jupiter and Saturn and is made up of hydrogen, helium, and methane. The third largest planet, Uranus orbits the sun once every 84 earth years and is the only planet to spin perpendicular to its solar orbital plane. In January 1986, the unmanned U.S. spacecraft Voyager 2 visited the planet, discovering 10 additional moons to the five already known, and a system of faint rings around the gas giant.


So there you go! And you thought I only knew how to run!!!!

Enjoy your solar journey one giant leap for mankind at a time....
Lily

8 comments:

blondie said...

Cool Science lesson. I did not these things.

and I knew there was more to you than running, silly girl.

*hugs*
~ b

Marcy said...

I thank you for this little lesson. Seriously! It's amazing how much we forget (well at least me LOL) once we leave school.

Marcy said...

Oooohhh and you know what? I just looked on your little side thingy . . .are you going to do the Boilermaker? Utica isn't that far from me (maybe 1.5 hr) I'll have to see what's going on during that month ;-)

Bob - BlogMYruns.com said...

Ahhhhhhh I think I am going to Enjoy MY solar journey.

Thanks for the lesson.

David said...

So, Beavis and Butthead didn't make it into the "official" historical documents, huh? Pretty cool info, though. Thanks for the enlightenment!

Mendy said...

LMAO at David. I bet he was laughing before he even finished reading the title emcompassing "uranus".

Thanks for the info. I learned something today.

Lily on the Road said...

I was hoping there would be some giggles going on!!!

Mission accomplished!!

Beavis and Butthead, that just cracked me UP!!! I figured Homer Simpson would have come up too!

jahowie said...

It's good to know that I'm not the only science geek. :-) Cool post.