orbit
Gravity keeps planets and satellites in orbit. This topic is part of Astronomy within Science & Nature. This page currently draws on 72 supporting questions, with answers and bonus facts available below.
orbit trivia questions
An orbit is the path of one object around what?
Answer: Another object
Bonus fact: Gravity keeps planets and satellites in orbit.
What force keeps planets in orbit around the Sun?
Answer: Gravity
Bonus fact: Gravity bends their motion into orbital paths.
According to Kepler, planetary orbits are generally what shape?
Answer: Ellipses
Bonus fact: The Sun lies at one focus of each ellipse.
What point do two stars in a binary orbit around?
Answer: Common center of mass
Bonus fact: The barycenter depends on the masses of the stars.
How many major planets orbit the Sun?
Answer: Eight
Bonus fact: Pluto is classified as a dwarf planet.
How long does Earth take to orbit the Sun?
Answer: About 365.25 days
Bonus fact: The fractional day leads to leap-year adjustments.
Hubble orbits primarily in which region?
Answer: Low Earth orbit
Bonus fact: A 1993 servicing mission corrected Hubble's original mirror flaw.
Which Apollo mission became the first crewed spacecraft to orbit the Moon?
Answer: Apollo 8
Bonus fact: Apollo 8 carried Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and William Anders around the Moon in December 1968.
Most asteroids in our solar system orbit the Sun between Mars and which planet?
Answer: Jupiter
Bonus fact: The main asteroid belt lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
According to Kepler's first law, planets orbit the Sun in what shape with the Sun at one focus?
Answer: Ellipse
Bonus fact: Kepler showed that planetary orbits are ellipses rather than perfect circles.
What is the point in the Moon's orbit farthest from Earth called?
Answer: Apogee
Bonus fact: Perigee is closest; apogee is farthest.
Nicolaus Copernicus proposed that planets orbit what?
Answer: Sun
Bonus fact: His heliocentric model placed the Sun near the center.