- A -
| WORD | MEANING |
| A.S.I. | Agenzia Spaziele Italiana - The Italian Space Agency. |
| Adrastea | Moon of Jupiter, discovered in 1979 by Voyager, 2nd closest moon to Jupiter, diameter 40 km (25 miles) In mythology, Adrastea was the daughter of Jupiter and Ananke and the distributor of punishments and rewards. |
| Aldrin, Edwin "Buzz" | Apollo 11 astronaut. Second man to walk on the Moon's surface. |
| Alpha Centauri | The 3rd nearest star to Earth, after the Sun and Proximus Centauri. 4.4 light years away. Also the fourth brightest star in the sky, after the Sun, Sirius and Canopus, with a magnitude of -0.3. |
| Apollo | Name given to missions in the 1960s and 1970s designed to land man on the Moon and return him home. Three astronauts testing Apollo 1 died in a fire in the capsule. Apollo 4 - 6 were unmanned launches. Apollo 7 was a manned launch but didn't go to the Moon. Apollo 8 - 10 were manned launches to the Moon (but were not designed to land). Apollo 11 - 17 were manned missions to land on the Moon. No moon landing took place during Apollo 13 due to an explosion onboard. |
| Amalthea | Moon of Jupiter, discovered in 1892 by Edward Emerson Barnard. 200 km (150 miles) in diameter. In mythology, Amalthea was a nymph who nursed a young Jupiter with goat's milk. |
| Arcturus | Fifth brightest star in the sky, 36 light years from Earth, magnitude 0.0 |
| Armstrong, Neil | Apollo 11 astronaut. First man to walk on the Moon's surface. |
| Asteroid | Small rock fragments left over from the formation of the Solar System left to float around space. |
| Asteroid Belt | Region in between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter where a large number of asteroids orbit the Sun. |
| Astronaut | A person who travels into space. Russia/Soviet name equivalent is Cosmonaut. |
| Astronomical Unit | A unit of measurement used for measuring distances in space. 1 A.U. is equal to the approximate distance from the Earth to the Sun (150 million kilometres). |
| Astronomy | The study of the objects in the sky, eg: stars, planets, moons, galaxies, comets, asteroids, etc. |
| Astrology | The belief that the positions of the Sun, Moon, stars and planets can affect a person's destiny. |
| Atmosphere | The layer of gas surrounding the surface of a planet, moon or star. |
| Atom | A tiny particle of matter, itself made up of many particles of matter. |
| Axis | The imaginary line around which a planet, moon, star spins. |
- B -
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
| Barnard's Star | Fourth nearest star to Earth. 5.9 light years away. | |
| Belinda | Moon of Uranus. Discovered in 1986 by Voyager 2., approx 80km in diameter, 10th moon is distance from Uranus. Belinda was the heroine in Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock. | |
| Billion | One thousand million. 1 billion is written 1,000,000,000 | |
| Black Hole | The core of a collapsed star. Its gravity is so strong that not even light can escape. |
- C-
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
| Callisto | Moon of Jupiter, third largest moon in the Solar System, 99% the size of planet Mercury | |
| Celestial object | Any object which appears in the sky - the Moon, Sun, planets, stars, galaxies, etc. are all celestial objects. | |
| Charon | Moon of Pluto, discovered in 1978 and about one third of Pluto. | |
| Cluster | A group of stars or galaxies which stay in a cluster by their common gravity. | |
| Coma | The "ball" part of the comet, surrounds the nucleus. | |
| Comet | Small ball of dust and gas which orbits the Sun, often in elliptical (oval) orbits. Only visible when they are close enough to the Sun to start burning off their dust/gas. Some comets take a few decades to complete an orbit, others take thousands of years. Some comets are also known to orbit Jupiter. | |
| Constellation | A group of stars, named by ancient astronomers because of their appearance (kind of like dot-to-dot). The twelve signs of the zodiac are named after twelve constellations. | |
| Cosmonaut | Russian/Soviet word for Astronaut. |
- D -
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
| Day | Length of time it takes for a planet to completely rotate on its axis. Usually referred to Earth, often referred to as a "Sol" when talking about other planets to avoid confusion. (a "Sol" on Mars is slightly longer than a "Day" on Earth). | |
| Density | A measure of how closely packed matter is. Gas is less dense (less compact) than water. Water is less dense than a solid. | |
| Desdemona | Moon of Uranus, discovered by Voyager 2 in 1986. |
- E -
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
- F -
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
| A.U. | ||
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| A.U. | ||
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| A.U. | ||
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- J -
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- L -
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- M -
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- N -
| WORD | MEANING | LINK |
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- O -
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| A.U. | ||
Callisto
Cosmonaut
D
E
Earth
F
G
Galilei, Galileo
Ganymede
H
I
J
Jupiter
K
L
M
Mars
Mercury
Moon
Moon, The
N
Neptune
O
P
Planet
Pluto
Q
R
S
Satellite
Saturn
Star
Sun
T
U
Uranus
V
Venera
Venus
Viking
Voyager
W
X
Y
Z
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