Earth: Mass, Volume and Distance

• Earth is the third planet from the sun.
• It is the fifth largest planet in the solar system.
• Only the gas giants Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are bigger.
• Earth is the largest of the terrestrial planets of the inner solar system, bigger than Mercury, Venus and Mars.
• But how big is the Earth, exactly?

Earth Mass:

Unit of Mass in Astronomy:

The astronomical unit of mass is the Solar Mass. It is equal to the mass of the Sun, about 333000 times the mass of the Earth or 1048 times the mass of Jupiter.

The GM⊕ product for the Earth is called the geocentric gravitational constant and equals (398600441.8±0.8) ×106 m3 s−2. It is determined using laser ranging data from Earth-orbiting satellites, such as LAGEOS-1.

The GM⊕ product can also be calculated by observing the motion of the Moonor the period of a pendulum at various elevations. These methods are less precise than observations of artificial satellites.

Earth’s Volume:

Earth’s Relative Size:

• Earth is the largest of the four rocky planets closest to the sun.
• Venus, which is almost its twin in terms of size, has a volume that is 86 percent that of Earth, but the volume of Mars is only 15 percent as great, and that of Mercury only 5 percent.
• You could fit six Mars-size and almost 20 Mercury-size planets inside Earth.
• On the other hand, you could fit 1,321 Earth-size planets inside Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, and about 1.3 million planets the size of Earth would fit inside the sun.

Distances Between Earth and Planets:

• The distances between planets will vary depending on where each planet is in its orbit around the Sun.
• Sometimes the distances will be closer and other times they will be farther away.The reason for this is that the planets have elliptical orbits and none of them are perfect circles.
• As an example, the distance between the planet Mercury and Earth can range from 77 million km at the closest point, to as far as 222 million km at the farthest.
• There is a huge amount of different in the distances between the planets depending on their position on their orbit path.
• The table below shows the eight planets and the average distance between them. The AU column is the distance in astronomical units.
• 1 AU is the distance from the Sun to Earth, which is 149,600,000 km.

DISTANCE TABLE:

Interesting Facts:

• The word “mass” comes from the Greek word “maza” meaning “lump of dough.”
• Scientists estimate that the total mass of the universe is between 1052kg and 1053 kg.
• 1000kg is equal to a metric tonne.
• Greek philosopher Plato said that weight was the natural tendency of objects to seek their kin.
• The gravity of Earth can vary as much as 0.5% depending on where you are on Earth.
• If you weigh 100 pounds on Earth you would weigh 37.7 pounds on Mars and 236.4 pounds on Jupiter.
• There is no gravity in outer space, so if you were floating somewhere in space, you would be weightless!
• The smallest known mass belongs to the photon, which is a tiny particle of light.