Synopsis

On the Topics in Earth

and Space Science

Submitted by:
Enguito, Damsel F.
Masterand

Submitted to:
Mrs. Ma. Lourdes Sering
Assistant Professor
The Sun

The sun is a yellow star. There are lots of stars, but sun is the closest one on
Earth. It is the center of our solar system. The sun is a hot ball of glowing gases. It
keeps our planet warm enough for living things to thrive. It gives us light so we can see.
The sun is by far the largest object in the solar system. It contains more than 99.8 % of
the total mass of the Solar System. It is also a huge sphere made up of mostly of two
gases. 71% of the sun’s mass is hydrogen and 27% of its mass is helium while the
remaining 2% is oxygen and carbon.
Eight planets move around the sun. We call that orbit. The planets are :Mercury,
Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Lots of smaller worlds orbit
the sun. There are many asteroids and comets that go around the sun too.
The Sun is the center of the Solar System and life on Earth. Plants use
photosynthesis in order to harness energy from the Sun. Even energy that we get from
fossil fuels like oil originally came from the Sun. We can also use solar cells to convert
energy from the Sun directly into electricity.

The Origin of the Solar System

The earliest scientific attempts to explain the origin of the Solar System invoked
collisions or condensations from a gas cloud. The discovery of ‘island universes’, which
we know to be galaxies, was thought to confirm these latter theories.
 The Nebular theory: Hydrogen and the other gases swirled around and
condensed into our sun and its planets. Nebula – any cloud or interstellar gas
and dust. It was the first heliocentric theories for the formation of the solar
system. A nebula collapse in on its own gravity, forming disc. Over time the disc
developed “Protoplanets” in rings around the “Protosun” a hot ball of gas well on
its way to become “the Sun”. Planetesimals collided and formed larger bodies
called “protoplanets” The four largest protoplanets became the “Jovian planets”
and the four smallest the “Terrestrial planets”. Almost all the objects formed in
the same disc they all now revolve in the plane of the ecliptic. Almost all objects
rotate in the same direction, as the sun rotates on its own axis. Almost all objects
revolve around the sun in the same direction as the sun rotates.
 The Fission theory: One day our sun burst open, and planets and moons shot out
at high speeds and went to their respective places, then stopped, and started
orbiting the sun, as the moons began orbiting the planets.
 The Capture theory: Planets and moons were flying around, and some were
captured by our sun and began circling.
 The Accretion theory: A pile of space dust and rock chunks pushed together into
our planet, and another pile pushed itself into our moon. Then the moon got
close enough and began circling the earth.
 The Planetary Collision theory: Our world collided with a small planet, and the
explosion threw of rocks which became the moon and then it began orbiting us.
 The Stellar Collision theory: Our planets, moons and suns spun off from the
collision between stars.
  The Gas Cloud theory: Gas cloud was captured by our sun. But instead of being
drawn into it, they began whirling and pushing themselves into planets and
moons.
Origin of the Planets
Mercury started out like all planets, a solar nebula. It formed out of disk of gas
and dust that swirled around the sun. Venus formed 4 billion years ago. Venus
warmed from the inside and separated into layers . After Venus started cooling down
and its crust thickened. Earth was hot ball white flaming gases with really high
temperature this was caused the particles to come together. Mars was formed from
craps of earth and Venus after all the dust gathered it all clumped together creating
a planet we call Mars. Jupiter begins with ice and dust like all the other gas giants.
Small ice dust particles came together forming large objects. Saturn formed started
out vast cloud of cold gas and dust which was disturbed somehow – perhaps by
colliding with another cloud, or the shock wave from supernova. Uranus received a
great deal of rock and ice; enough to make it third- largest planet in solar system.
The first 2/3 is of Neptune is composed of a mixture of molten rock, water, liquid,
ammonia and methane. The outer third is a mixture of heated gases comprised of
hydrogen, helium, water and methane.

The Structure of the Earth

The structure of the Earth is divided into layers. These layers are both physically
and chemically different. The Earth has an outer solid layer called the crust, a highly
viscous layer called the mantle, a liquid layer that is the outer part of the core, called the
outer core, and a solid center called the inner core. The shape of the earth is an oblate
spheroid, because it is slightly flattened at the poles and bulging at the equator.

The boundaries between these layers were discovered by seismographs which

showed the way vibrations bounced off the layers during earthquakes. Between the
Earth's crust and the mantle is a boundary called the moho. It was the first discovery of
a major change in the Earth's structure as one goes deeper. Earth’s layers are;

 The crust is the outermost layer of the Earth. It is made of solid rocks. It is
mostly made of the lighter elements, silicon, oxygen, aluminium.
 The mantle is the layer of the Earth right below the crust. It is made mostly of
oxygen, silicon and the heavier element magnesium. The mantle itself is divided
into layers. The uppermost part of the mantle is solid, and forms the base of the
crust. It is made of the heavy rock peridotite. The continental and oceanic plates
include both the crust proper and this uppermost solid layer of the mantle.
Together this mass makes up the lithosphere.
 The Earth's core is made of solid iron and nickel, and is at about 5000–6000 °C.
it is divided in two layers the Outer core is a liquid layer below the mantle and
the Inner core, is the very center of the Earth.

Plate Tectonics
 Plate tectonics is the theory that the outer rigid layer of the earth (the lithosphere)
is divided into about a dozen " plates" that move across the earth's surface relative to
each other, like slabs of ice on a lake.

   The movement of the plates is driven by convection cells in the mantle so the plates
are continuously jostling against each other. Geologically, the most important things
happen at plate boundaries, including most of the earthquakes, volcanos, igneous
rocks, major metamorphism, and mountain building processes. Interplate regions tend
to be rather boring.
     There are three kinds of plate boundaries.

Divergent boundaries are where plates separate from each other, and magma
oozes up from the mantle into the crack (a fissure volcano) making the ocean basin
wider. This is known as sea floor spreading.

Convergent boundaries are where plates come together, but to do so one of the
plates must dive below the surface into the mantle along a subduction zone.
Convergent boundaries produce mountain chains of very large, explosive volcanos
(composite type).

     And, transform boundaries where plates slide past each other, ideally with little or
no vertical movement. Most transform boundaries are below sea level and so not easy
to see. The San Andreas fault in California is a transform boundary.

Rocks and Minerals

Rocks make up all of the material of the landmasses of Earth and are defined as
an aggregate of minerals and silicates and are predominantly found in the solid state of
matter. Rocks are split into separate categories such as sedimentary and igneous which
define the way they were created or formed. Rock allows for the building of structures
through the use of concrete, bricks, stucco, and a myriad of other uses. In addition,
rocks also comprise the crystals formed such as salts and precious gemstones like
diamonds and sapphires. Some rocks are formed from the decay of organic materials
as in the case of coal and peat. Even clocks use rocks in the form of quartz for their
time keeping. Rocks will typically have more generic names like boulder, stone, pebble
and mountain and do not usually have proper names such as copper or basalt.

Minerals are naturally occurring substance made from geological processes that
possess a characteristic chemical composition, a particular atomic structure and specific
properties. Minerals can be anything from salt to aluminum and encompass a wide
range of materials. Minerals allow for every industry to function and flourish in today's
economy and are used in industries like road construction, building, medical remedies
and skin care as well as defense and automobile production. A basic difference
between rocks and minerals is that rocks are made up of two or more minerals but
minerals are not made up of rocks. All minerals have proper names like aluminum and
gallium and are formed by very specific processes.
 Some minerals and rocks exhibit unique and special properties that have been
used by humans for centuries and some are just plain fun. Fluorescence is a property of
some minerals that contain atoms that absorb ultraviolet light. This light is then emitted
in the form of visible light that humans can see and in some instances it seems to glow.
Another similar effect is that of phosphorescence. This is caused by atoms in the
mineral that hold the extra energy of light for some time after being "charged" with light.
The Glowing numbers on a watch are caused by phosphorescence. Minerals like quartz
are able to pulse when electricity is applied to them. They have been used as time
keeping devices for centuries and are typically crystalline in nature. Depending upon the
crystal the timing or pulses change and can be kept to a steady beat.

Telescope

A telescope is an optical instrument that makes distant objects appear magnified

by using an arrangement of lenses or curved mirrors and lenses, or various devices
used to observe distant objects by their emission, absorption, or reflection of
electromagnetic radiation. The first known practical telescopes were refracting
telescopes invented in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 17th century, by using
glass lenses. They were used for both terrestrial applications and astronomy.

The reflecting telescope, which uses mirrors to collect and focus light, was
invented within a few decades of the first refracting telescope. In the 20th century, many
new types of telescopes were invented, including radio telescopes in the 1930s and
infrared telescopes in the 1960s. The word telescope now refers to a wide range of
instruments capable of detecting different regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, and
in some cases other types of detectors.

Earthquake

Earthquakes occur as a result of movement deep in the Earth's crust, often

resulting in faults. These faults or cracks are created by the slow drift of the Earth's
major plates. The most commonly occuring and most destructive earthquakes occur at
a very shallow point below the earth's surface, usually about thirty miles beneath the
surface. Less destructive earthquakes can occur up to 400 miles below the surface.
Earthquakes can also take place under water and this event occasionaly produces giant
tidal waves called tsunamis. Historically the most seismic activity has been along the
border area of two or more plates, although some on occasion do occur away from a
plate boundary.

The magnitude of an earthquake is most commonly measured using the Richter scale, a
logarithmic measure of the amplitude recorded by a seismograph. This scale ranges
from 0 to greater than 9, with 0 being the lowest magnitude and least intense, and 8.6
being the highest magnitude recorded. Another device used to measure earthquakes is
the Mercalli scale, which is a scale that ranges from 1 to 12, with 12 being the most
intense. Categories are established based on the type of damage recorded.
Volcano

A volcano is a mountain that opens downward to a pool of molten rock below the
surface of the earth. When pressure builds up, eruptions occur. In an eruption, gases
and rock shoot up through the opening and spill over or fill the air with lava fragments.
Eruptions can cause lava flows, hot ash flows, mudslides, avalanches, falling ash and
floods. The danger area around a volcano covers about a 20-mile radius. Fresh volcanic
ash, made of pulverized rock, can be harsh, acidic, gritty, glassy and smelly. The ash
can causes damage to the lungs of older people, babies and people with respiratory
problems. Volcanic lightning occurs mostly within the cloud of ash during an eruption,
and is created by the friction of the ash rushing to the surface. Roughly 200 accounts of
this lightning have been witnessed live. An erupting volcano can trigger tsunamis, flash
floods, earthquakes, mudflows and rock falls. More than 80% of the earth's surface is
volcanic in origin. The sea floor and some mountains were formed by countless volcanic
eruptions. Gaseous emissions from volcano formed the earth's atmosphere. There are
more than 500 active volcanoes in the world. More than half of these volcanoes are part
of the "Ring of Fire," a region that encircles the Pacific Ocean. Active volcanoes in the
U.S. are found mainly in Hawaii, Alaska, California, Oregon and Washington, but the
greatest chance of eruptions near areas where many people live is in Hawaii and
Alaska. The sound of an eruption volcano can be quiet and hissing or explosive and
booming. The loud cracks travel hundreds of miles and do the most damage, including
hearing loss and broken glass. The most deadly eruptions have occurred in Indonesia,
with tens of thousands of lives lost to starvation, tsunami (as a result of the eruption),
ash flows, and mudflows. 

Weathering and Erosion

Weathering is the process that changes solid rock into sediments. With
weathering, rock is disintegrated. It breaks into pieces. Once these sediments are
separated from the rocks, erosion is the process that moves the sediments. While plate
tectonics forces work to build huge mountains and other landscapes, the forces of
weathering gradually wear those rocks and landscapes away. Together with erosion, tall
mountains turn into hills and even plains.

Comets

Comets are objects composed mostly of ice and dust that grow tails when they
approach the sun. All comets have a nucleus, which is the hard rock/ice object. When a
comet nucleus nears the sun, solar energy begins to heat the ice and vaporize it. The
gas flies off the comet, sometimes violently enough to break the nucleus apart, and
throws dust up with it. The gases form a cloud around the nucleus called the coma.
Some of the gas is stripped of electrons and blown back by the solar wind. This forms a
bluish colored ion tail. The dust particles are pushed away from the comet by solar
radiation, forming a dust tail that can be many millions of miles long. The dust tail is the
easiest to see with the unaided eye, but occasionally the ion tail is visible as well. Each
time a comet passes close to the sun, it loses more of its ice. Eventually, after many
passes, the comet may no longer have enough material to form tails. Its surface will be
covered by dark dust and it will look more like an asteroid.

Asteroids, Meteors, Meteoroids and Meteorites

An asteroid is a celestial body - composed of rock, metal or a mixture of both -

that is orbiting the Sun. Most of them are in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
Even though there are millions of asteroids with sizes up to more than 500 km (like
Pallas and Vesta) they are of no danger to the planet Earth. The biggest body in the
asteroid belt - Ceres - is officially not called an asteroid anymore but a dwarf planet. If
you try to envision the asteroid belt don't get fooled by some science fiction films:
travelling around in the asteroid belt with your spacecraft doesn't require constant
steering in order to avoid crashes with asteroids. The scale of the solar system is so
immense that even inside the asteroid belt the average distance between two asteroids
is above one million km - or three times the distance between Earth and the Moon.

Generally speaking, meteoroids are all the smaller objects in orbit around the
Sun. Most of them originate from comets that lose gas and dust when they approach
the Sun. Other meteoroids are basically small asteroids. There is no exact diameter that
distinguishes an asteroid from a meteoroid. Wikipedia states 10 metres; other
trustworthy sites call anything smaller than 1 km a meteoroid. Anyhow, the vast majority
of all meteoroids are just a few millimetres and less in size. The smallest and by far the
most numerous ones have sizes of small dust particles and are called micrometeoroids;
they do not leave any visible trace behind when they enter the Earth's atmosphere. The
ones about the size of a pebble leave behind a flash of light when they completely
vaporise. Most people call this flash a "shooting star" or a "falling star", but more
accurately spoken this is a meteor. A meteor is the light that you can see when a small
meteoroid enters the Earth’s atmosphere. This normally happens with speeds between
11 and 73 km/s and at altitudes of about 75-120 km. Under a clear sky an observer can
see 5 to 10 meteors per hour, especially after midnight when the Earth has rotated so
far that the observer's part of the sky is positioned in the direction of the Earth's motion
around the Sun.

Finally, every asteroid or meteoroid that survives its passage through Earth's
atmosphere (and this is the rare exception) can be advanced to be called a meteorite.
Meteorites are made of rock (stony meteorites), metal (iron meteorites) or a mixture of
these two materials (stony-iron meteorites or pallasites). Pallasites form beautiful olivine
crystals that are embedded into a metal matrix. Scientists are eager to study meteorites
since they are the very first material that was formed in our early solar system, almost
4.6 billion years ago. Sun.org offers genuine meteorites for sale in our meteorite shop.

Geologic Time Scale

The Geologic Time Scale is a way of organizing Earth's 4.5 billion-year history. The time
scale is divided into four large periods of time—the Precambrian, Paleozoic Era,
Mesozoic Era, and Cenozoic Era. National parks preserve fossils from each of these
time blocks.

The Precambrian (prior to 542 million years ago) was the "Age of Early Life." Soft-
bodied creatures like worms and jellyfish lived in the world's oceans. The land remained
barren. Common Precambrian fossils include mats of algae called stromatolites,
microorganisms, and simple animals.

The Paleozoic Era (542 to 251 million years ago) Fish diversified and marine
organisms were very abundant during the Paleozoic. Common Paleozoic fossils include
trilobites and cephalopods such as squid, as well as insects and ferns. The greatest
mass extinction in Earth's history ended this era.

The Mesozoic Era (251 to 65.5 million years ago) was the "Age of Reptiles."
Dinosaurs, crocodiles, and pterosaurs ruled the land and air. As climate changed, sea
levels rose world-wide and seas expanded across the center of North America. Large
marine reptiles such as plesiosaurs, along with the coiled-shell ammonites, flourished in
these seas. Common Mesozoic fossils include dinosaur bones and teeth, and diverse
plant fossils.

The Cenozoic Era (65.5 million years ago through today) is the "Age of Mammals."
Birds and mammals rose in prominence after the extinction of giant reptiles. Common
Cenozoic fossils include cat-like carnivores and early horses, as well as ice age fossils
like wooly mammoths. Caves can preserve the remains of ice-age animals that died in
them or were transported there after death.

Natural Resources

Natural resources are components that exist in the world without the input of
humans. These natural resources are diverse ranging from renewable resources to non-
renewable resources, living to non-living resources, tangible to intangible resources.
Natural resources are essential to the survival of humans and all other living organisms.
All the products in the world use natural resources as their basic component, which may
be water, air, natural chemicals or energy. The high demand for natural resources
around the world has led to their rapid depletion. As a result, most nations are pushing
for proper management and sustainable use of natural resources.

Types of Natural Resources

Natural resources could be classified into different categories such as renewable and
non-renewable resources, biotic and abiotic resources, and stock resources.

Renewable Natural Resources

Renewable resources refer to resources that can naturally regenerate after use.
They include resources such as wind, water, natural vegetation, solar energy,
 and animals. These resources exist in nature in abundance. There is little
concern about depleting renewable resources because their rate of production
exceeds the rate of human consumption. Conservationists throughout the world
advocate for the use of renewable resources because they are readily available
and less costly to the environment.

Non-renewable Natural Resources

Non-renewable resources are components that take too long to replenish after
use or exist in limited quantities. Non-renewable resources include products such
as crude oil, precious metals, minerals, and rocks. Some endangered animals
are also classified as non-renewable resources because their mortality rate is
much higher than their reproduction rate. These non-renewable resources need
to be protected and to be used responsibly to stop their depletion.

Biotic Natural Resources

Biotic natural resources refer to living resources that exist naturally in the
environment. Such resources include forests, wildlife, and fossil fuels, which are
all listed as biotic natural resources.

Non-biotic Natural Resources

Non-biotic natural resources are natural products in the environment that are
non-living. These resources include water, rocks, metals, and minerals among
many others.

Stock Natural Resources

The world has numerous resources some of which are yet to be exploited.
Humans lack the skills and technology to extract and use some of the naturally
occurring resources like rare gases and some radioactive materials. As a result,
these resources are classified as stock resources to be utilized in the future.

Continental margin

Continental margin, the submarine edge of the continental crust distinguished by

relatively light and isostatically high-floating material in comparison with the adjacent
oceanic crust. It is the name for the collective area that encompasses the continental
shelf, continental slope, and continental rise. The characteristics of the various
continental margins are shaped by a number of factors. Chief among these are
tectonics, fluctuations of sea level, the size of the rivers that empty onto a margin as
determined by the amount of sediment they carry, and the energy conditions or strength
of the ocean waves and currents along the margin.

Aquifer, Freshwater, Contamination and Water Pollution

 An aquifer is a body of saturated rock through which water can easily move.
Aquifers must be both permeable and porous and include such rock types as
sandstone, conglomerate, fractured limestone and unconsolidated sand and gravel.
Fractured volcanic rocks such as columnar basalts also make good aquifers. The rubble
zones between volcanic flows are generally both porous and permeable and make
excellent aquifers. In order for a well to be productive, it must be drilled into an aquifer.
Rocks such as granite and schist are generally poor aquifers because they have a very
low porosity. However, if these rocks are highly fractured, they make good aquifers. A
well is a hole drilled into the ground to penetrate an aquifer. Normally such water must
be pumped to the surface. If water is pumped from a well faster than it is replenished,
the water table is lowered and the well may go dry. When water is pumped from a well,
the water table is generally lowered into a cone of depression at the well. Groundwater
normally flows down the slope of the water table towards the well.

Fresh water is vital to life and yet it is a finite resource. Of all the water on Earth,
just 3% is fresh water. Although critical to natural and human communities, fresh water
is threatened by a myriad of forces including overdevelopment, polluted runoff and
global warming. With this in mind, WWF partners with communities, businesses and
others to decrease pollution, increase water efficiency and protect natural areas to
ensure enough clean water exists to conserve wildlife and provide a healthy future for
all.
Contamination is the presence of a constituent, impurity, or some other
undesirable element that soils, corrupts, infects, makes unfit, or makes inferior a
material, physical body, natural environment, workplace, etc. There are nuances of
contamination and those are: chemical, environmental and agricultural, radioactive,
interplanetary and food beverage and pharmaceutical contamination.
Water pollution occurs when harmful substances—often chemicals or
microorganisms—contaminate a stream, river, lake, ocean, aquifer, or other body of
water, degrading water quality and rendering it toxic to humans or the environment.
Astrobiology

Ever since early humans first looked skyward and imagined the stars as distant
campfires, humanity has wondered if we are alone in the Universe. The ancient Greeks
argued against our home planet being the only cradle for life, but lacked the technology
to prove their beliefs. In the late 20th century, the near-simultaneous discoveries of the
possible remains of bacterial life in a Martian meteorite, and the first planets orbiting
other stars, brought the question of the existence of life beyond the Earth to the
forefront of scientific endeavor. In the 21st century, the new field of Astrobiology
harnesses the required technological and scientific capability to seriously address this
ancient and fundamental question.

Astrobiology is the study of life in the universe. The search for life beyond the Earth
requires an understanding of life, and the nature of the environments that support it, as
well as planetary, planetary system and stellar processes.   To provide this
understanding, astrobiology combines the knowledge and techniques from many fields,
including astronomy, biology, chemistry, geology, atmospheric science, oceanography
and aeronautical engineering.

Star formation
Star formation is the process by which dense regions within molecular clouds in
interstellar space, sometimes referred to as "stellar nurseries" or "star-forming regions",
collapse and form stars. As a branch of astronomy, star formation includes the study of
the interstellar medium (ISM) and giant molecular clouds (GMC) as precursors to the
star formation process, and the study of protostars and young stellar objects as its
immediate products. It is closely related to planet formation, another branch of
astronomy. Star formation theory, as well as accounting for the formation of a single
star, must also account for the statistics of binary stars and the initial mass function.
Most stars do not form in isolation but as part of a group of stars referred as star
clusters or stellar associations.