Image credit: NASA/Messenger

Announcements:

• Note about craters...objects impact, or hit, a surface. The resulting hole in the ground is a crater.
• Remember to put all lab partners' names on your lab report.
• If there's not enough space on printed lab report to fully answer a question, use another sheet of paper.
• Extra Credit -- only as assigned and per individual

Purpose:

• To see how the orbit of an inferior planet (Mercury) can be constructed from a set of simple measurements

Introduction to some terms & concepts:

• inferior planet
• elongation
• the great thing about greatest elongation
• perihelion/aphelion
• eccentricity

Reminders & tips for this lab:

• Do this lab in pencil!!
• Be careful not to confuse western and eastern elongation
• All of the lab questions refer to the orbit you plot. Thus, it is worth taking the time to do Exercise #2 very carefully!
• And as always....don't forget campus observatory: 9-10pm on Mondays and Thursdays

Last modified: Sept 30, 2008