Uranus

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Uranus’s atmosphere is mostly hydrogen but it also contains large amounts of a gas called methane. Methane absorbs red light and scatters blue light so a blue-green methane haze hides the interior of the planet from view.
 * Uranus spins lying on its side (like a barrel), this is perhaps due to a large collision early in its formation.
 * Uranus was the first planet discovered by telescope.
 * Since Uranus takes 84 [[image:tmsmawakasci5/sticky-pads_300.jpg width="59" height="69" align="left"]] Earth years to go around the sun, this means that each of its poles is in daylight for 42 years and in darkness for the next 42.

===Voyager 2 false-color image of Uranus taken from 2.7 million km. The atmosphere of Uranus is incredibly clear and appears blue-green in color naturally. This picture is a composite of 3 images taken by the wide-angle camera using orange, short-wavelength methane, and long-wavelength methane filters. The processing brings out high-altitude hazes, including the pink area centered on the south pole. The bluest regions are the most haze free. Uranus is about 51,000 km in diameter. (Voyager 2, P-29497)=== Like Jupiter and Saturn, Uranus is a gas giant. But Uranus is a little different. Unlike all the other planets and most of the moons in our Solar System, Uranus spins on its side. It is believed that long ago a very large object smashed into this planet. The crash was so powerful that it completely changed the direction of Uranus' planetary rotation. However, a more recent theory is that the extreme tilt of Uranus' axis may have been caused by a large moon that was slowly pulled away from the planet by another large planet long ago when our Solar System was still new. It is thought that the gravitational pull of this moon moving away from Uranus may have caused it to tilt on its side. Like Saturn, the thick atmosphere of Uranus is made up of methane, hydrogen and helium. But Uranus is an extremely cold planet. It has been called the "ice giant." It is believed that Uranus is made up of rock and ice and has a rocky core. Because of the tremendous planetary pressure of Uranus, there could possibly be trillions of large diamonds in or on the surface of this planet. Scientists also believe that on the surface of Uranus there may be a huge ocean. And, interestingly, it is thought that the temperature of this ocean may be extremely hot, maybe even as hot as 5000 degrees Fahrenheit one of the biggest astronomical organizations in the world and we look after the interests of astronomers not just in the UK but across the world. What I'm going to do today is give you a few pointers to get you started in astronomy which I think is one of the most incredibly interesting subjects there is. There are very many things about the Earth that make it a special place.

Obviously, the most important thing of all is that it has lots of life and abundance of life, so many millions and millions of different plant and animal species. The reason the Earth is so pleasant is that it's exactly the right distance from the sun. If it were further out, it might be too cold.

If it were closer in, it would be too hot. But it's in exactly the right place, smack in the middle of what astronomers call the Goldilocks Zone. It also has a big moon to stabilize its axis.

It doesn't wildly swing around so we don't generally get very very sharp changes in climate, just the kind of thing that keeps it habitable and a pleasant place to live. We also are lucky enough to have an abundance of liquid water on the surface, one of the key ingredients that allows, at least, human beings to thrive and we also have the other advantage of a big magnetic field that keeps out a lot of the harmful radiation from space that would eventually actually help strip away from of our atmosphere. So, all these things together make it a rather special place and it's no surprise that astronomers are looking elsewhere in the universe, looking elsewhere in the galaxy for planets and other stars like the Earth because they think that planets like the Earth with that special set of circumstances are good places to search for life. .