What is Neptune?
What is Neptune? Let’s spend a few minutes on Neptune. Neptune is our solar system’s eighth and farthest known planet from the sun. Here are some key facts about Neptune. It is an ice giant with around 50,000 km diameter or around 31,000 miles. It is 17 times the mass of Earth. It takes about 165 Earth years to complete one orbit around the sun. A length of day in Neptune, that is one rotation on its axis, takes about 16 hours. Let’s jump into its composition and structure. The first thing? Its atmosphere mostly comprises hydrogen, and you’ll even trace methane. The methane gives Neptune its characteristic blue color. It’s believed to have a core made of rock and metal, surrounded by a mantle of water, ammonia, and methane, and the temperature there is extremely cold. With average temperatures around 214 degrees Celsius, or 353 degrees Fahrenheit, these two temperatures are negative.
Next, let’s move on to the weather. Neptune has some of the most violent weather in the solar system, including a large storm system. Similar to Jupiter’s great red spot, the great dark spot is a notable storm. The planet has the strongest winds in the solar system. Its speed reaches up to 2,100 km per hour, that is 1,300 miles per hour. Is Neptune surrounded by moons or rings? Well, Neptune has 14 known moons. The largest and most significant is Triton, which is unique due to its retrograde orbit, indicating Neptune’s gravity may have captured it. Neptune has five main rings, which are faint if you look at them from a distance, and they’re composed mainly of dust particles and, of course, small rocks. The Voyager 2 is the only spacecraft to have visited Neptune.
It was called NASA’s Voyager 2, which flew by the planet in 1989, providing most of the current knowledge that we have today about Neptune. Of course, the knowledge that I’ve given you comes from the Voyager 2 itself.
Here are some interesting facts.
Neptune was discovered on September 23, 1846, by Johan Gail, and Henry Delrest, based on predictions by Urban Leouirier and John Couch Adams. And distance from the Sun, on average, Neptune is about 4.5 billion kilometers,2.8 billion miles away from the Sun. Neptune is a fascinating planet with many mysteries, still to be explored, particularly regarding its deep atmosphere and internal structure. I hope you liked the video, and don’t forget to subscribe to my channel, and hit the bell icon to be notified of my videos in the future as well.