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Exam 13: Comets and Asteroids: Debris of the Solar System

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Question 1

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Why were asteroids not discovered until the 19th century?

A) although asteroids are the same size as the planets, they are completely covered with dark dusty material, which means they reflect almost no light
B) in their long looping orbits, it was not until the 19th century that an asteroid came close enough to the Earth to be detectable
C) several asteroids collided with each other in early 1801, calling them to the attention of astronomers
D) asteroids are generally small compared to planets and require a good telescope and patient searching to spot them
E) only after Halley's work did astronomers think to look for the tails which allow us to spot an asteroid

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Question 2

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Which of the following is NOT an accomplishment of the Rosetta mission to Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko (C-G) ?

A) Rosetta matched orbits with Comet C-G and flew alongside
B) Rosetta dropped the Philae lander on Comet C-G
C) Rosetta took close-up images of Comet C-G and sent them back to Earth
D) Rosetta took samples of the surface material of Comet C-G and sent them back to Earth
E) Rosetta turned off the spacecraft systems to save power far from the Sun, and turned them back on as it got closer to the Sun
Section 13.4: The Origin and Fate of Comets and Related Objects

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Question 3

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Comets change as they approach the Sun in their orbits. Which of the following statements about a comet approaching the Sun is FALSE?

The comet that broke into more than 20 pieces and then collided with Jupiter in 1994 was

A baseball pitcher wants to impress his girl-friend with how strong his throwing arm is. On which of the following bodies would the pitcher be MOST likely to be able to throw a baseball (a fast ball) so fast it would actually go into orbit?

Between 1992 and today, astronomers using large telescopes have discovered many icy pieces that orbit in the same region as the orbit of Pluto. These are believed to be members of the

Which of the following statements about NEO's (Near Earth Objects) is TRUE?

The large reservoir of comet nuclei far beyond Pluto, from which we believe new long-period comets come into the inner solar system, is called:

The spacecraft that got the closest to the nucleus of Halley's Comet and sent back dramatic photographs of what the nucleus looked like was:

Astronomers estimate that there may be a trillion (a thousand billion) comet nuclei orbiting beyond Pluto. Why then do we not see more comets in our skies?

According to our textbook, what is the best way to defend ourselves against an asteroid which is on course to collide with the Earth in 7 years?

Different asteroids reflect different percentages of the light falling on them. This is due to the fact that they have different:

Short-period comets like Comet Halley

According to astronomical tradition, who gets to suggest the name for a newly discovered asteroid?

Astronomers have realized that the surface of Ida is older than the surface of Gaspra. How do they measure this?

In addition to hundreds of smaller objects they have been discovering in the Kuiper Belt recently, astronomers were surprised to find

If there are at least a million asteroids, how did spacecraft like Galileo survive their trip through the asteroid belt?

When the Dawn spacecraft explored the largest asteroid Ceres, it discovered white spots that appear to be salt and volcanic mountains made of water ice. This led astronomers to which of the following ideas:

Why do astronomers today think that we have an asteroid belt and not a planet between Mars and Jupiter?

In the far future, an entrepreneur with a large fleet of space ships decides to capture and bring to Earth some valuable asteroids. If at that time, there is a shortage of usable metals on Earth, what type of asteroids should his employees search for?