My Solar System
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About
Topics
- Motion
- Acceleration
- Velocity
- Position
- Gravity
Description
Build your own system of heavenly bodies and watch the gravitational ballet. With this orbit simulator, you can set initial positions, velocities, and masses of 2, 3, or 4 bodies, and then see them orbit each other.
Sample Learning Goals
- Predict the necessary mass, velocity, and distance from the sun of a planet in order for this planet to make a circular orbit around a sun.
- What happens when you increase or decrease the mass of the planet, but keep everything else constant? Does this agree with your prediction?
- What happens to the orbit of the planet when you increase or decrease the magnitude of the velocity of the planet, but keep everything else constant?
- What happens to the planet's orbit when the increase or decrease the initial distance between the planet and the sun?
For Teachers
Teacher-Submitted Activities
| Title |
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Authors | Level | Type | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alignment of PhET sims with NGSS |
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Trish Loeblein | HS | Other | 10/19/15 | |
| How do PhET simulations fit in my middle school program? |
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Sarah Borenstein | MS | Other | 10/19/15 | |
| MS and HS TEK to Sim Alignment | Elyse Zimmer | HS MS |
Other | 10/19/15 | ||
| Phet Solar System Simulation Lab | Pauline Seales | HS | Lab | 5/19/15 | ||
| Worlds of Wonder | Dean Baird, Paul G. Hewitt | HS UG-Intro |
Lab | 10/19/14 | ||
| Solar System Momentum | Juan Fernandez | HS | Lab | 10/10/13 | ||
| Satellite Motion Lab | Scott Goelzer | HS | Lab | 5/13/13 | ||
| Things you can show with 'My Solar System' | Carlo Smits | MS K-5 |
Demo CQs |
9/28/12 | ||
| AP Physics Orbit Lab | Dan Burns | HS UG-Intro |
Lab | 4/5/12 | ||
| AP Physics Gravity Lab | Michael F. Gallo | HS | Lab | 1/12/12 | ||
| Universal Gravitation | Sarah Stanhope | HS UG-Intro |
Lab | 1/27/11 | ||
| Gravity Lab | Dan Burns | MS HS |
Lab | 1/21/11 | ||
| Gravity and Planetary Orbits Lab | Patrick Harmon | HS | Lab | 4/22/10 | ||
| How does the mass and velocity of a satellite affect the orbit? | Carlton Rink | HS | Lab | 1/15/09 | ||
| Trip to Mars | Elizabeth Praton | UG-Intro | Lab | 4/11/08 | ||
| Modeling a planetary system | Mark Kelly | HS | Lab | 3/3/08 | ||
| Orbits--effects of mass and distance | Chris Cochran | MS | Lab HW |
12/7/07 | ||
| Exploring Gravitation | David Simmons | HS | Lab | 9/18/07 | ||
| Lecture Demonstrations and Reviews the SIMS, My Solar System | Nancy Spletzer | HS | CQs | 3/11/07 |
Translations
Software Requirements
| Windows | Macintosh | Linux |
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Microsoft Windows XP/Vista/7 Macromedia Flash 9 or later
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OS 10.5 or later Macromedia Flash 9 or later
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Macromedia Flash 9 or later
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Credits
| Design Team | Third-party Libraries | Thanks To |
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