Neo Earth

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Tuesday, May 3- Haumea and Makemake

Haumea and its two moons
Hi Everyone,

During class on Tuesday, I presented on Haumea and Makemake. Those are two different dwarf planets located far, far away from our planet, even further away than Pluto! They both have some things in common, like being dwarf planets is one example, but on the other hand, there are many other things that make them different.


Haumea is a dwarf planet discovered in 2004 by Michael E. Brown’s team. In 2005, J.L. Orbitz’ team also discovered it. Since it was discovered around Christmas time, the scientists decided to name it “Santa”. When it got its real name, Haumea, it was named after the Hawaiian goddess of childbirth and fertility.

Haumea is known to be made up completely of rock.

Haumea’s symbol is a simplification of Hawaiian petroglyphs of “woman” and “childbirth”. It looks like this:

Haumea’s diameter is 1960 km at the equator, and 2500 km at the poles. You might think that this is weird. This is because Haumea’s shape is like an American football. Scientists believe that this is because Haumea has a very fast rotation (3:55) which stretched out the planet. The mass of Haumea is 1021kg, and the density is 2,600-3-300 kg/m3

Haumea is a very cold planet – it is approximately -241 degrees Celcius! The land is also hard, cold, and rocky.

Haumea has two moons, Namaka and Hi’iaka. Just like the planet itself, these moons have “Santa names” – Rudolf and Blixten, two of Santa’s reindeer. The diameter of the moons is….? As you can see, Hi’iaka is larger than Namaka. Haumea is a dwarf planet and can, because of that, not have rings.

Haumea is located in the Kuiper belt and actually passes Pluto’s orbit. It also passes Neptune’s orbit, since it is a TNO (Trans-Neptunian Object).

All the Trans-Neptunian Objects to Scale

Haumea is the third brightest object in the Kuiper belt after Pluto and MakeMake, and was officially Haumea symbolcategorized as a dwarf planet in 2008.

<--Makemake
Name and
Discovery
  • Before Makemake was given an official name, it was called Easterbunny, because it was discovered close to Easter time. Makemake got its name from the fertility god in the mythology of Rapanui (Easter Island). Makemake was discovered by Micheal E. Brown, C.A Trujio, and D. L. Robinowitz on March 31, 2005.

    Size

    Makemake’s diameter is between 1300 and 1900 km approximate mass is about 4x1021. Its density is approx. 2,000 km/m3.

    Symbol

    The symbol of Makemake looks like the letter M on Roman petro glyphs and the face of the god Makemake. (to the left is the symbol)


    Revolution and Rotation

    Rotation- 22.48 Earth hours

    Revolution- 305.34 Earth years

    Climate

    Makemake’s temperature is approximately -240°C.

    Land/Atmosphere

    Sometimes Makemake has an atmosphere and it sometimes doesn’t. Makemake has an atmosphere when it is closer to the Sun and it doesn’t when it is farther away from the Sun due to its orbit that enters Pluto’s orbit and exit Pluto’s orbit.

    Location in Solar System

    Makemake is a Kuiper Belt Object. The Kuiper Belt is an area beyond Neptune which is extremely cold and icy. Makemake enters only Pluto’s orbit during its revolution.

    Moon

    Makemake has no moons and no natural satellites.

    Rings

    And also has no rings.

    Surface:

    Makemake is covered with frozen methane, and iron oxide which gives it a red color as you can see in the picture on the side. It is the second brightest object from the dwarf planets.

    Other interesting facts

    Makemake is the fourth dwarf planet recognized in our solar system. It is about 2/3 the size of Pluto, and only slightly further away from the sun compared to Pluto.

    It is the only dwarf planet in the region without satellites.

    Makemake is known as a “plutoid” which is a name for all the dwarf planets further away than Neptune, and Haumea is as well.

    It was one of the first planets to get a non-Greek/Latin name.

    Last plutoid to be discovered

    _________ :D ____________

    Here are some links that will inform you more about the Red Spot on Haumea and more about dwarf planets in general, and a link to Moodle. There you can also find the notes for Haumea and Makemake.




    5 comments:

    1. Hey Iva
      Your post was quite longs and you had a lot of information, you even included the interesting facts. I noticed that you did not have any color in your text but you only colored the headings, in my opinion, it made it look more professional. You also included a picture of both of your dwarf planets and their symbols. great, long post
      -Vance

      ReplyDelete
    2. Iva - nice work here overall. You have covered everything you presented on and posted on time. Your information about Makemake is formatted better than Haumea and is easier to follow and read (bold, colored words). I assume this is where you had issues when posting from home, but they possibly could have been fixed here at school. You have included quite a few pictures and they are captioned well. Plus, you have explained the science of why these objects are dwarf planets and how weird they truly are in a clear manner. The best aspect of your post is your links. They all work, meet all of the requirements and even present some new information about the Red Spot on Haumea and what Dwarf Planets are - well done here. Overall, thanks for reviewing the rubric before you posted, because it meant you met every requirement of this assignment! Yay! ~Ms. D.

      ReplyDelete
    3. Hey Iva,
      Your post is great and understandable, plus it includes the necessary information. The color of the main text maybe could be more creative than black, and you could maybe have one or two more pictures. You explain the science clearly and the units included for distance and temperature are great and help visualize. Your links suit the subject of the post, and are a great addition to the post. Overall, very good post and much better than any of the others you have done.
      Nathan

      ReplyDelete
    4. Hey Iva,
      Like all the others said, this was a great post! You had pictures, links, exciting voice, and more. There really isn't much to change; however, I think that you could have explained more about what happens to the atmosphere of Makemake (why it disappears.) I know you had a lot of trouble with the color of this post, but I think that you could have tried t make the Haumea section look. Ittle more colorful. The Makemake section is perfect! Other than that, there isn't much to say except for that this is great! :)

      ReplyDelete
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