how do we know some planets are gaseous?

207 views

I mean, Jupiter can’t be solid at center and have huge a layer of gases on top?

In: 5

2 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

This answer is going to be a bit confusing, but our concept of “solid”, “liquid”, and “gas” is very much tied to the world humans live in, the temperatures and pressures we experience in our daily lives. But in space it’s possible to reach temperatures and pressures far, far, far, beyond our experience and we get these weird states of matter that fit the scientific definitions of solid or liquid, but don’t fit our “concept” of what a solid or liquid look like.

That being said, we don’t *know* what’s in the center of a gas giant, but we can make educated guesses. The most common theory for something like Jupiter does have a solid core, most likely made of super heavy metallic elements kind of like the Earth does. A smaller group of scientists theorize it would have a liquid core, but again “liquid” doesn’t really like a glass of water exactly.

You are viewing 1 out of 2 answers, click here to view all answers.