The Solar System

Our Solar System contains of eight planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune. They are all centred around the Sun, a star which provides a gravitational force on the planets keeping them in orbit. The solar system also contains numerous dwarf planets (including Pluto), comets, asteroids and meteoroids. The solar system was formed 4.6 billion years ago from a giant interstellar molecular cloud.

Why doesn’t Earth have rings? © Science Photo Library

Why doesn’t Earth have rings?

Earth has a new Trojan asteroid © Getty

Earth has a new companion asteroid that will share our orbit for 4,000 years

We now know that the Sun is at the centre of our Solar System, but great thinkers weren’t always so sure © Getty Images

Does our Solar System have a wall?

The Solar System’s top 20 moons ranked. Why? Because we can… © NASA

20 of the most amazing moons in the Solar System

solar eclipse 2021 UK© Getty

Solar eclipse 2021: How and when to see in the UK

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Psyche: The metal mini-world that could change everything we know about the Solar System

Alien life in our Solar System: 5 best places to look © Magic Torch

Alien life in our Solar System 5 best places to look

No, an asteroid probably won’t smash into Earth the day before the US elections, and here’s why © Getty / Mark Wilson

Reality Check No, an asteroid probably won’t smash into Earth the day before the US elections, and here’s why

The next giant leaps: The UK missions getting us to the Moon © Acute Graphics

The next giant leaps The UK missions getting us to the Moon

Planet Nine could be a grapefruit-sized black hole, say astrophysicists © M Weiss

Planet Nine could be a grapefruit-sized black hole, say astrophysicists

Neowise seen from the International Space Station © NASA

Neowise An increasingly rare opportunity to spot a comet with the naked eye

What’s the tallest mountain in the Solar System? © Getty Images

What’s the tallest mountain in the Solar System?

Solar system. Artwork of the eight planets orbiting the Sun (upper centre), as seen from the orbit of Saturn (lower left). The orbits of the planets are shown as blue lines. Distances and sizes are not to scale. In their order from the Sun, the planets are: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars (the small, rocky inner planets), Jupiter (centre right), Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune (the outer gas giant planets). The latter two are at upper left. In August 2006, Pluto (not shown) became a Dwarf planet. The asteroid belt (between Mars and Jupiter) is also seen, and the Milky Way galaxy is in the background.

The Solar System How do we know how it formed?

Move over, Mars: why we should look further afield for future human colonies © Getty Images

Move over, Mars: why we should look further afield for future human colonies

Mysterious Martian landforms made by mud, not lava © Petr Brož (Czech Academy of Sciences)

Mysterious Martian landforms made by mud, not lava