Galileo Galilei
Post 1900
Who was GalileoGalilei
physicist and philosopher but was better known for his love of mathematics and astronomy. He is most famous for inventing the 1st telescope and in his honour NASA made a spacecraft named after him.
The Discoveries
of Jupiter and saw our own moon in detail. He also made the stages of Venus which is based on Nicholas Copenicas' theory that the Earth and Planets revolve around the Sun. He figured this when he looked at Venus, the second innermost planet, and repeated this for a few weeks. He noticed that Venus has stages, just like the moon. This led to him to a disagreement with the Catholic church. They believed that the Universe revolved around the Earth. Because Galileo proved them wrong, they bought it to court. Sadly, on the 23rd of September, 1632,Galileo was put under house arrest for the rest of his life.
Galileo facing court
How this helps us.
Galileo on his telescope
This is my favourite of Galileo's quotes.
Another one of his best quotes
The NASA Messenger Mission
What was it built for?
Key Dates
17th of March 2011-Arrived at Mercury
30th of April 2015- Mission successful
Its Discoveries and Contributions
It also discovered that the planets core is about 85% percent of its actual size.
Mercury is the least explored planet in our solar system so MESSENGER is very important to expand our knowledge. For instance, the original Mariner 10 gave incorrect information about the planet's magnetosphere. if it wasn't for MESSENGER, we would still have incorrect information about Mercury
DID YOU KNOW!!
MESSENGER is only the second spacecraft sent to Mercury (right) . The last one - Mariner 10 - completed its mission in 1975.
To reach Mercury orbit, the spacecraft traveled 7.9 billion kilometers (4.9 billion miles).
The spacecraft circled our Sun 15 times before it settles in Mercury orbit.
Glossary
geologic formations- the rock,dirt etc. formations on the planets surface