Welcome to Astronomy of Planets, a website by Astronomy 104 students at the University of Saskatchewan

Each link in the main menu above will take you to a page showcasing research done by Astronomy 104 students on various topics in planetary astronomy. You can also navigate directly to any project page through the drop-down menu that appears when hovering your mouse over any of the main topics.

The web is full of information about fascinating solar system phenomena. For example, you may have read that Jupiter and other planets have auroras like we see on Earth. Or you may be aware that there are moons surrounding the giant planets of our solar system which have global liquid water oceans beneath their surfaces. You might even have heard that Mars occasionally has liquid water at its surface.

These are just a few of the fascinating things that have been learned by doing science within our solar system. Reading about the latest discoveries in astronomy, you may often find yourself wondering how we know these things that we know—e.g., you may wonder what kinds of signals are actually detected, and how they relate to scientific theories.

The aim of this website is to go beyond simply reporting what we’ve learned about various solar system objects, and explain how we know it. You will find explanations of why the gaps in Saturn’s rings exist, why Uranus and Neptune are blue, what causes Earth’s auroras, and much more—along with the details of how we know each of these things.