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How have recent discoveries changed our perception of the solar system?

Birtha Scarlett

Recently, there have been a lot of big discoveries about the solar system that have changed how we think about it. One of the biggest things is that we now know that there are a lot more planets out there than we used to think!

For a long time, people thought that there were only eight planets in our solar system. But now we know that there are actually a lot more than that. Scientists have found many small objects orbiting around the sun that they think could be planets too. They call them "dwarf planets" because they're smaller than the eight planets we already knew about. Some examples of these dwarf planets are Pluto, Haumea, and Makemake.

Another big discovery is that there is a lot more going on in our solar system than we realized. For a long time, we thought that the sun was just sitting there in the middle and the planets were all just going around it. But now we know that there are actually a lot of things going on between the planets too!

One thing we've learned is that there are a lot of small objects out there called asteroids and comets. These are pieces of rock and ice that are left over from when the solar system was first formed. Some of them come close to the Earth and can be seen with telescopes or even with the naked eye. Scientists are also studying these objects to learn more about how the solar system formed.

We've also learned a lot about the moons that orbit around the planets. For example, Jupiter has more than 70 moons! Each of these moons is unique and has its own story to tell about the history of the solar system.

Overall, all these discoveries have taught us that the solar system is much more complex and interesting than we ever imagined. We still have a lot to learn, but thanks to the hard work of scientists and astronomers, we are learning new things every day!