Question: Eris: Planets 2006, part 4. In July 2005, astronomers Mike Brown, Chad Trujillo, and David Rabinowitz announced the discovery of a sun-orbiting object, since named Eris,6 that is 5% larger than Pluto. Eris orbits the sun once every 560 earth years at an average distance of about 6300 million miles from the sun. Based on its Position, how does Eris's Distance from the sun (reexpressed to logs) compare with the prediction made by your model of Exercise I?
Exercise I: Planet distances and order 2006. Let's look again at the pattern in the locations of the planets in our solar system seen in the table in Exercise II.
a) Re-express the distances to create a model for the Distance from the sun based on the planet's Position.
b) Based on this model, would you agree with the International Astronomical Union that Pluto is not a planet? Explain.
Exercise II: Planet distances and years 2006. At a meeting of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in Prague in 2006, Pluto was determined not to be a planet, but rather the largest member of the Kuiper belt of icy objects. Let's examine some facts. Here is a table of the 9 sun-orbiting objects formerly known as planets:
a) Plot the Length of the year against the Distance from the sun. Describe the shape of your plot.
b) Re-express one or both variables to straighten the plot. Use the re-expressed data to create a model describing the length of a planet's year based on its distance from the sun.
c) Comment on how well your model fits the data.