Let’s Get Quizzical: Space

It’s time to test your knowledge on all things space. From black holes to blue moons, do you have what it takes to be an astronaut? Answers below...

1. Which planet has the fastest rotation?

a) Mars

b) Jupiter

c) Neptune

d) Earth

2. How many stars are in the Milky Way?

a) 1 billion

b) 175,000

c) 250 million

d) 100 thousand million

3. Who was the first woman to travel into space?

a) Naoko Yamazaki

b) Valentina Tereshkova

c) Roberta Bondar

d) Helen Sharman

4. Where is the Asteroid Belt located?

a) Between Mars and Jupiter

b) Between Earth and Mars

c) Between Saturn and Uranus

d) Between Mercury and Venus

5. How long does it take the sun’s rays to reach Earth?

a) Six seconds

b) Three days

c) One hour

d) Eight minutes

6. Which of these best describes the atmosphere surrounding Venus?

a) Cold and wet

b) Hot and poisonous

c) Bright and sunny

d) Cold and snowy

7. The largest volcano in the solar system is called Olympus Mons. Where is it?

a) Jupiter

b) Mars

c) Venus

d) Earth

8. What are comets mostly made of?

a) Dirty ice and dust

b) Hot, liquid rock

c) Rusty metal

d) Poisonous liquid

9. Who invented the telescope?

a) Galileo

b) Johannes Kepler

c) Hans Lippershey

d) Hypatia

10. Does space smell?

YES

NO

ANSWERS

 

1. The answer is b) Jupiter!

Jupiter is the fastest spinning planet in our solar system rotating on average once in just under 10 hours. That is very fast especially considering how large Jupiter is. This means that Jupiter has the shortest days of all the planets in the solar system.

2. The answer is d) 100 thousand million!

Astronomers estimate there are about 100 thousand million stars in the Milky Way alone. Outside that, there are millions upon millions of other galaxies too!

3. The answer is b) Valentina Tereshkova!

The first woman to travel in space was Soviet cosmonaut, Valentina Tereshkova. On 16 June 1963, she was launched on a solo mission aboard the spacecraft Vostok 6. She spent more than 70 hours orbiting the Earth, two years after Yuri Gagarin's first human-crewed flight in space./p

4. The answer is a) Between Mars and Jupiter!

The Main Belt lies between Mars and Jupiter, roughly two to four times the Earth-sun distance, and spans a region about 140 million miles across. Objects in the belt are divided into eight subgroups named after the main asteroids in each group.

5. The answer is d) Eight minutes!

The speed of light is 299,792,458 metres per second. The distance between the earth and the sun is 92.95 million miles. Scientists calculate that the average time it takes for light to reach the earth from the sun is 8 minutes and 20 seconds.

6. The answer is b) Hot and poisonous!

The atmosphere of Venus is made up mainly of carbon dioxide, and thick clouds of sulfuric acid completely cover the planet. The atmosphere traps the small amount of energy from the sun that does reach the surface along with the heat the planet itself releases.

7. The answer is b) Mars!

Olympus Mons is a shield volcano 374 miles in diameter 16 miles high, and is rimmed by a 4 mile high scarp. A caldera (a large cauldron-like hollow) 50 miles wide is located at the summit of Olympus Mons.

8. The answer is a) Dirty ice and dust!

Comets are frozen leftovers from the formation of the solar system composed of dust, rock and ice. They range from a few miles to tens of miles wide, but as they orbit closer to the sun, they heat up and spew gases and dust into a glowing head that can be larger than a planet.

9. The answer is c) Hans Lippershey!

The first person to apply for a patent for a telescope was Dutch eyeglass maker Hans Lippershey (or Lipperhey). In 1608, he laid claim to a device that could magnify objects three times. His telescope had a concave eyepiece aligned with a convex objective lens.

10. The answer is Yes!

We can't smell space directly, because our noses don't work in a vacuum. But astronauts aboard the ISS have reported that they notice a metallic aroma – like the smell of welding fumes – on the surface of their spacesuits once the airlock has re-pressurised.