Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun. It is an amazing planet that captures the interest of scientists with its bright blue color and active atmosphere. Neptune is known as the “windy planet” because it is home to the fastest winds in the solar system, reaching speeds of over 1,200 miles per hour.
Neptune was discovered in 1846. This gas giant remains a source of mystery due to its remote location and the extreme conditions that prevail on its surface.
Neptune’s wild weather, faint rings, and interesting moons provide many fascinating facts that help us learn more about the outer parts of our solar system. So keep scrolling and know it!
Interesting Neptune Facts
Neptune Is Our Solar System’s Most Distant Planet
Neptune is approximately 4.5 billion kilometers from the Sun, which implies it is 30 times further away from the Sun than Earth.
Uranus is the nearest planet to Neptune, with an average distance of 11 astronomical units (AU; 1 AU = distance from Earth to the Sun).
Neptune had been observed numerous times before its official discovery:
Astronomers have been exploring the sky since the early 1600s better to comprehend the universe and our place in it. Galileo Galilei initially saw Neptune in 1613, although it was not recognized as a new planet then.
French astronomer Jerome Lalande is said to have seen Neptune in 1795, and John Herschel, the son of Uranus discoverer William Herschel, is said to have seen it in 1830 without understanding what he was looking at.
Neptune Is 58 Times Larger and 17 Times Heavier than Earth
Neptune’s equatorial radius is roughly four times that of Earth, bringing its total volume and mass to nearly 63,000,000,000,000 km3 and 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg, respectively.
Despite being 58 times larger in volume than Earth, Neptune is only 17 times heavier due to its far lower density of 1.6 g/cm3 (Earth’s density is 5.5 g/cm3).
A Year on Neptune Is About 165 Earth Years Long
Because Neptune is the most distant planet from the Sun, its orbit around the Sun is 30 times longer than Earth’s, and its orbital velocity is more than five times slower, requiring 165 Earth years to complete one circle around the Sun.
This means that it takes more than 60,000 Earth days to orbit the Sun, but because days on Neptune are shorter (at 16 hours), one Neptunian year has nearly 90,000 days.
A 200-Pound Person Would Weigh 228 Pounds on Neptune
If you could somehow visit Neptune and find a set of scales while you were there, you might be disappointed to learn that you weighed much more than you believed.
This is because Neptune’s gravity (11.15 m/s2) is 14% greater than Earth’s. The gravitational pull of Neptune is the second largest in our solar system, after only Jupiter’s at around 25 m/s2.
Neptune Is More than Three Billion Miles Away from Earth
Because both planets constantly move through the solar system, their distance also changes. The shortest distance between the two is approximately 2.7 billion miles.
At its greatest, it is approximately 2.9 billion miles, which means that light from Earth would take approximately four hours to reach Neptune. And how long would it take an Earth-bound spacecraft to reach Neptune? Depending on the path chosen, 10 to 15 years.
The Planet Neptune Is Named After the Roman God of The Sea
Neptune facts demonstrate that before it was named after the Roman deity of the sea, Neptune (corresponding to the Greek Poseidon), in December 1846, it was known (or suggested to be known) by a variety of other names, including “Le Verrier” and “Le Verrier’s planet” after the man who discovered it.
The names “the planet outside Uranus,” “Janus,” and “Oceanus” were also proposed for the solar system’s newest planet.
Only One Spacecraft Has Visited Neptune so Far
Given the huge distance between our planet and Neptune, it is hardly surprising that only one spacecraft has ever contacted Neptune in human history.
The space mission Voyager 2 sailed by Neptune in August 1989 at a distance of around 3,000 miles from its north pole, supplying us with most of the data we have about Neptune today.
After being launched from Earth, Voyager 2 took over 12 years to reach Neptune, but the probe was delayed on several occasions along the way, visiting Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus as well.
Neptune, Like Other Gas Giants, Does Not Have a Solid Surface
Neptune, like the other gas giants in our solar system (Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus), has no defined surface layer consisting of gas transitioning into a slushy water and ice layer.
The blue tint visible in images of the planet is actually the top of its clouds, not its surface. In photographs, Neptune appears as a vivid azure blue instead of Uranus’ considerably milder blue.
Winds on Neptune Can Reach Speeds of Over 1,300 Miles per Hour
Even the most intense storm winds on Earth rarely reach 300 mph; thus, it is apparent that the high winds on Neptune would make life on Earth very impossible.
In fact, we can’t even fathom the power of these terrifying gusts. The rapid wind speeds are caused mostly by the planet’s extremely hot innards colliding with the great coldness of space.
Triton, Neptune’s Largest Moon, Has a Retrograde Orbit
Neptune facts show that its largest moon, Triton, orbits the planet in the opposite direction of its rotation, making it the only massive moon in our solar system to do so.
Additionally, Triton’s orbit around Neptune is practically a perfect circle, with an eccentricity of only 0.000016 (for comparison, the Moon’s eccentricity in its orbit around Earth is 0.0549, and the Earth’s eccentricity in its orbit around the Sun is 0.0167).
Neptune’s Triton is one of the coldest places in our solar system
Neptune facts reveal that not only is Neptune one of the coldest planets in the solar system, but its largest moon Triton is considerably colder, with temperatures on its surface reaching around – 400 °F (- 240 °C).
This massive, frozen moon is covered in explosive geysers that blast nitrogen gas several kilometers into space.
Different Languages Have Their Own Names for Neptune
One of the fascinating Neptune facts is that most languages worldwide have their own version of the word “Neptune” to refer to the planet.
For example, the Chinese, who have no link to ancient European deities, refer to Neptune as the “Sea King Star,” even though Neptune is the god of the sea. The Greeks have their own version of the Roman god Neptune; they call this azure-blue planet Poseidon.
Triton Is the Only Moon of Neptune that Is Spherical in Shape
Neptune facts suggest that the planet’s other 12 moons are all unevenly formed, with only Triton being spherically shaped.
What distinguishes Triton from the others? Triton is unique among Neptune’s moons because the other moons’ surfaces are all too small to have collapsed into a spheroid.
Neptune Rules the Astrological Sign Pisces and Is Exalted in Leo
Neptune is a sign of sensitivity, idealism, compassion, and occasionally illusion, deception, or confusion for those who believe in the art of astrology. It represents materiality piercing the spirit.
Many astrological practitioners consider Neptune, often known as the Planet of Illusion, essential. It is thought to help eliminate obstacles and boost people’s experience of mystical events.
Sometimes Neptune’s Orbit Brings It Closer to The Sun than Pluto
Pluto is currently regarded as a dwarf planet; thus, there is no debate about which planet is in the farthest reaches of our solar system.
Even when Pluto was still regarded as a planet, Neptune occasionally held the position of the ninth planet in our solar system simply because it orbits the Sun farther away than Pluto does (the last time this occurred was between 1979 and 1999).
There Is an Unknown Source of Internal Heat on Neptune
Neptune receives just around 0.1% of the solar energy that reaches the Earth since it is 30 astronomical units (1 AU = distance of Earth from the Sun).
However, it emits 2.6 times more energy than it receives from the Sun, indicating that it has its own internal heat source. Regrettably, we still have no idea what this is, where it is, or how it generates so much heat.
Neptune Has Had Storms Large Enough to Cover the Whole Planet
Neptune’s facts reveal that Neptune was previously destroyed by a massive storm capable of covering the entire Earth’s surface. When Voyager 2 visited Neptune in 1989, it discovered a massive storm moving westward at 750 mph in the southern hemisphere.
When scientists used the Hubble Space Telescope to picture the storm, dubbed Great Dark Spot, again in 1994, it had vanished, but a similar storm had emerged in the northern hemisphere.
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