Solar System - Earth
  1. What is the ionosphere composed of?
  2. Exactly how round is the Earth?
  3. Will Easter fall on the Spring Equinox in 1999, and how often does that happen?
  4. Where are the Van Allen radiation belts and are they important to life?
  5. How much of the earth's heat is produced by the Sun and internally?
  6. has human activity altered the mass of the Earth?
  7. What did the Earth look like as it was forming?
  8. Which hemisphere of the Earth gets the most sunlight each year?
  9. Is there a web site where I can zoom-in on any spot on the Earth and see what it looks like?
  10. How much starlight reaches the surface of the Earth at night?
  11. Is it pitch black in the center of the Earth?
  12. Do you weight differently at the North Pole than what you do at the equator?
  13. If the earth is spinning and moving through space, why don't we feel it?
  14. Exactly when is the earth nearest the sun?
  15. How much mass does the Earth gain from sunlight?
  16. How much less does a ship at sea weigh during the full moon?
  17. What seasons would the earth have if its axis were at 0 or 90 degrees?
  18. What did the astronauts nickname the earth from space?
  19. Why is there so much water on the Earth?
  20. Is the Earth a perfect sphere?
  21. Can you say more about the new moonlet discovered in orbit around the earth in 1997?
  22. Are there any man-made objects that astronauts can see from orbit?
  23. How can you tell if you are exactly at the North Pole and not a few miles away from it?
  24. How old is the Earth?
  25. What is the Earth's average temperature?
  26. Looking down on the North {ole, which way does the earth rotate?
  27. How fast is the Earth moving with respect to the rest of the universe?
  28. Why aren't the lengths of day and night exactly the same at the equinoxes?
  29. How can I find out my exact geographic location?
  30. How can I calculate the Earth's mass knowing only the distance to the Moon and the length of the lunar month?
  31. If the Sun stopped shining, how long would the Earth cool to Absolute Zero in a few days?
  32. Are we currently in an ice age that has lasted millions of years?
  33. Why does the Earth have radiation belts?
  34. Is the Earth's pole shifting?
  35. How did the Earth's atmosphere get to be so rich in nitrogen and not carbon dioxide?
  36. When the Earth's magnetic field reverses, does its rotation also switch?
  37. What is the average density of solar wind particles that produce the aurora?

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All answers are provided by Dr. Sten Odenwald (Raytheon STX) for the
NASA IMAGE/POETRYEducation and Public Outreach program.