Asteroid Belt
Rocky travellers between Mars and Jupiter
Between Mars and Jupiter, many rocky objects travel around the Sun. This is the main asteroid belt. In our picture it looks like a wide ring. Asteroids can be small or large, round or bumpy. They are leftovers from the birth of the Solar System. Jupiter’s strong gravity made it difficult for them to join into one big planet.
Vesta and the dwarf planet Ceres live here. Dawn explored both and sent photographs. But the belt is not a crowded rocky wall! There is lots of empty space between asteroids, so spacecraft can pass through. These ancient rocks help scientists learn how planets formed.
Play space games → Explore in the planetarium →In the planetarium you can spin this world and look at it from every side.
Artist’s impression · the surface is an illustration.
Sources and images
Celestial maps: Solar System Scope / INOVE · CC BY 4.0. Thumbnails were reduced and shaded. Artistic SVG maps were created for this project.