All the Planets from Inside

 All the Planets from Inside

all eight planets of our solar system are unique and made of very different stuff how about going on a space journey from the sun to neptune the farthest planet of the solar system we can check what's inside each celestial body on our way the sun we're starting our expedition from the sun a really big ball of gas and scorching plasma the star's core takes up to 25 percent of its entire radius inside gravitational forces create incredible temperatures and pressure which makes hydrogen fuse into helium this layer has a temperature of 27 million degrees fahrenheit give or take all that energy moves to a zone called radiative it takes on average 170 000 years for the energy to get all the way from the core to the next convective zone there bubbles of hot plasma float upward and end up at the sun's surface that's where a visible 300 mile thick layer starts this gassy zone and don't i know about gas is called the photosphere it gets heated to 10 000 degrees and consists of granules cells of plasma 600 miles in diameter each moving further we get to the crown that's the star's thin atmosphere it's getting hotter again with temperatures reaching three and a half million degrees so it better not linger mercury that's the first planet on our way the smallest of all the four inner planets mercury is just three thousand miles at the equator it's also the second densest planet topped only by earth mercury has a massive metallic core it takes up almost 85 percent of the planet's volume its core contains more iron than any other planet of the solar system recently it's been discovered mercury might have a solid inner core along with its outer core that consists of liquid metal the planet's outer shell is composed of a rocky mantle and solid cross which is just 250 miles thick mercury is too small to hold onto its atmosphere made up of hydrogen and helium the planet is also too close to the sun that's why the solar winds keep sweeping away the little atmosphere the planet manages to gather whoops there it goes venus our next stop is the hottest planet in the solar system with average temperatures reaching 870 degrees fahrenheit it means lead would melt if you brought it to venus the pressure on the planet's surface is the same as at a depth of 3000 feet under water on earth the planet's metallic iron core is 2400 miles wide which is almost as the distance from new york to los angeles the next layer is a molten rocky mantle that's 1200 miles thick the venus's insides are covered with a crust it consists mostly of basalt and is 6 to 12 miles wide the planet's thick atmosphere is nightmarish it's 96 of carbon dioxide with 3 of nitrogen and thick clouds of sulfuric acid venus also has a heck of a serve her sister serena is even better oops wrong venus never mind earth we've reached our home planet the densest in the solar system at the earth's center there's a core that takes up 15 of the planet's volume it consists of two parts the outer and the inner core the inner core is a solid ball made of iron and nickel its radius is 760 miles give or take which makes 20 of the entire earth's radius and 80 of the moon's radius the 1500 mile thick outer core is liquid it also consists of iron and nickel but it's not under enough pressure to be solid the temperature at the boundary of our planet's inner and outer core is 10 800 degrees that's as hot as the surface of the sun and the pressure there is three and a third million times the atmospheric pressure at sea level the mantle surrounds the outer core this layer is about eighteen hundred miles thick and makes nearly eighty four percent of the entire earth's volume it consists of silicate rocks rich in iron and magnesium the crust is a relatively thin layer that takes up only one percent of the earth's volume hey i like thin crust along with the upper part of the mantle it's broken into tectonic plates they move as fast as your fingernails grow and let heat escape from the earth's interior the crust is mostly made up of oxygen silicon aluminum iron and other minerals mars but it's time we leave our planet behind and move to the red planet it's the last of the inner planets which are also called terrestrial since they're made up of rock and minerals mars has a core made mostly of iron nickel and sulfur it's between 900 and 1200 miles across the core doesn't move that's why mars lacks a planet-wide magnetic field the weak magnetic field it has is just 0.01 percent of the earth's the mantle surrounding the core is composed of thick silicates oxygen and some other minerals you can probably compare it with soft rocky toothpaste yeah brush your teeth with that the mars mantel is also much thinner than the earth's it's just 800 to 1100 miles thick the planet's thin crust consists of volcanic basalt rock astronomers believe it isn't broken into tectonic plates and remains in one piece the crust is covered with fine reddish dust that looks like talcum powder i like my crust covered with tomato sauce and cheese jupiter the next planet on our way is very different from the ones we've already visited the largest planet in our solar system jupiter is a gas giant if the planet was 80 times as massive as it is now it would have a chance to turn into a tiny red dwarf star anyway if you decided to parachute into jupiter you would never land on a firm surface it's still unclear whether the planet's core is a molten ball of liquid or a solid rock 14 to 18 times the mass of earth there's even some evidence the gas giant's core might be melting right at this moment whatever the truth is the temperatures at the center of jupiter reach 63 000 degrees give or take around 90 percent of the planet's atmosphere is hydrogen the remaining 10 percent is made up of helium with tiny traces of other gases under immense atmospheric pressure hydrogen and helium gases turn into a dense fluid the deeper you go closer to the core this liquid becomes the mixture of metallic hydrogen and helium there's no solid ground on the planet that's why astronomers define the planet's surface as the point where the atmospheric pressure equals that on earth you wouldn't be able to stand on that surface though it's just another layer of gases but the gravitational pull there is more than two and a half times more powerful than that on our planet saturn welcome to the planet with the winds that travel at more than 1100 miles per hour at the equator it's also the planet with the big rings saturn is mostly composed of hydrogen and helium with some traces of methane ammonia and water but it contains more sulfur than jupiter which gives the planet a smog like orange hue the atmosphere of saturn isn't really different from its surface but the deeper you go the higher the pressure becomes and hydrogen becomes liquid further to the center of the planet this liquefied gas turns into metallic hydrogen like jupiter saturn might have a rocky core with hydrogen and helium surrounding it on the other hand even if it's made up of rocky material the core can still be liquid saturn is the least dense planet in the solar system it has 1 8 the average earth's density the planet is 95 times more massive than earth uranus look at this blue green planet on our way it's one of the two ice giants in our solar system it's composed of more ice than gas at the very center of uranus there is a rocky core small just half the earth's mass compared to other planets uranus core is rather cool only 9 000 degrees fahrenheit an ice mantle surrounds the solid core and that's the largest portion of the planet about 80 percent it's also not the eyes you might be thinking about it's a hot dense fluid made up of water ammonia ice and methane sometimes referred to as a water ammonia ocean uranus's atmosphere is mostly hydrogen and helium but it has its blue-green color because of methane gas that absorbs the red light neptune that's the final stop of our unusual journey and the second of the two outer planets known as ice giants it's also the windiest place in the solar system clouds of frozen methane are whipped across the planet at a speed of 1200 miles per hour neptune's core is solid and consists mostly of iron and some other metals its mass is 1.2 times bigger than that of earth the temperature inside reaches 9000 degrees astronomers also believe that at a depth of 4 500 miles there might be a diamond layer where it's raining diamond crystals over the planet's core there's a large mantle a superheated region of liquid with the temperatures getting as high as 3000 to 8500 degrees give or take the mantle is rich in methane ammonia and water and equals up to 15 times earth's mass neptune's atmosphere forms five to ten percent of the planet's mass and stretches twenty percent of the way down to its core it consists of eighty percent hydrogen nineteen percent helium and a bit of methane gas just like with uranus the methane gas is what gives the planet its bluish hue and its stinky pew.

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