Guardian of the Galaxies Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Milky Way

A galaxy is a huge connected system of stars, with planets that rotate around an object, like our sun, which is a star.

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is made up of our sun and our eight planets, called a solar system, plus billions of other planets and their moons, plus billions to trillions of stars, PLUS black holes, comets, asteroids and other space bodies. All held together by gravity.

No spacecraft carrying people have left our galaxy because it is too big. At the speed of light it would take almost one hundred thousand years to reach the edge, and super speed to escape the pull of gravity. This is why in TV and movies spaceships use wormholes and "warp speed" to get around.

Answer: Un-crewed

An "un-crewed" spacecraft is one that has no humans inside. It's without a crew. Maybe because it is going on trip that will take many, many years. Or, it could be a tiny ship, too small to carry people, going to do scientific tests. Some spacecraft we can't bring back, so of course we don't want people in them!

Voyager 1 is a very important un-crewed spaceship that we launched in 1977. It explored the planets Saturn and Jupiter, sending back amazing new information such as volcanoes on moons, and then it left our solar system, entering interstellar space in 2012. Interstellar space is between star systems. Voyager 1 was the first to travel this far from earth.

Answer: The sun

Yep, we almost touched the sun! In 2018 NASA sent the Parker Solar Probe to closely fly by our sun, reaching it in 2024. The Parker went by at least 25 times, and got the closest images of the sun's atmosphere ever made! We learned much more about the wind, heat, and weather on and around the sun. We had questions like, "Why is the area around the sun much hotter than the sun itself?" and "How does the wind on the sun impact Earth?"

To reach the sun we had to build the fastest object ever. It went 430,000 miles per hour. It was about the size of a car. The Parker had a special heat shield to guard it from the intense heat of the sun. The superhero Captain America uses his shield to block energy, too. The Parker will keep gathering data until some day when it runs out of fuel.

Answer: Satellites

A satellite is an object that moves around a bigger object. Human-made satellites are built and sent into orbit around Earth to gather and relay information. They use cameras or sensors to look into outer space, observe the Earth, act as guardians to keep watch on national security, monitor our weather, operate our GPS (Global Positioning System) and transmit signals so we can watch TV, use our phones and enjoy the internet.

There are more than seven thousand working satellites orbiting Earth, and thousands more that no longer work. You can see a dozen or so just by looking up into a clear night sky. Some are toaster size; some are as big as a school bus. Around dawn or dusk you can see the International Space Station. NASA has a website to help you locate it. There are even satellites called "superhero satellites", our guardians of the Earth, such as one that inspects our oceans and ice, and one that looks for any threatening asteroids that might be headed our way.

Answer: Mars

The planet Mars is often visible in the night sky as a steady orange-red light. Our first flight to Mars was in 1963, and again in 1965. We landed on Mars in 1971. Many spacecraft have landed on and explored it since then. There are plans to send a crew of people to Mars, but it is very cold at night, with giant dust storms and little gravity. The expense to get there is high and getting back impossible. Explorers would be exposed to radiation, could not breathe the air, and there's no food or water. There are many challenges, yet we continue to see a future where humans walk on that planet.

Mars was the god of war, the guardian of agriculture and protector of the ancient Romans. Mars was "the peace maker", using military might to prevent war. He also kept away crop diseases. In the English language the planet was named after the Roman god Mars because its red color reminded people of war.

Answer: Venus

Venus is called the "morning star" because ancient people did not know it as a planet. It is the hottest planet in our solar system, surrounded by thick, poisonous clouds. The ancient Romans named it after the goddess Venus for its very bright beauty, being our beloved close neighbor that accompanies dawn. The goddess Venus was guardian of love, gardens, beauty and battle victory.

It was 1961 when we first flew by the planet Venus with Venera 1, the first flight between planets. We have returned to study the surface many times. Scientists think Venus may have been a nice place to live, a very long time ago, but due to increasing carbon monoxide and cloud cover, all water evaporated and Venus became toxic.

Answer: Asteroid

In September of 2022 we sent the spacecraft DART to purposely crash into a small asteroid named Dimorphos, to see whether we could change its direction. As asteroid is an object much smaller than a planet, made of rock and metal, orbiting the sun. Sometimes they hit the Earth, and those we call meteorites.

We were able to alter the course of Dimorphos, but we also learned that rocks, boulders and rubble were knocked off the asteroid, becoming high-speed fragments that could cause trouble.

Learning how best to impact oncoming asteroids helps guard us against large asteroids that head toward Earth, such as asteroid 2024 YR4, which we tracked in 2024. We soon realized there was a 3% chance it might hit Earth in 2032. Small meteorites hit the Earth regularly, usually causing no harm. But 2024 YR4 could level an entire city.

On closer study we saw that asteroid 2024 YR4 is the size of a football field, and will fly so close we'll be able to look up and see it. But don't worry, it's expected to clear the Earth, though there is a 2.1% chance it will hit us, and a smaller chance it could hit our moon. As it nears Earth we'll be able to calculate its path, called a trajectory, with great precision. Meanwhile, we'll continue to study how to use spacecraft to knock asteroids away.

Answer: The moon

That's "one giant leap for mankind..." said astronaut Neil Armstrong in July 1969 as he took the first human step ever made on our moon. Many Native cultures consider the moon a guardian being who watches over us and our planet. It is true the moon does many good things. We are guided as we travel, it lights up our nights, its phases allow us to time activities like planting and harvesting crops, and it makes us happy with its glowing beauty.

It also helps steady the Earth's tilt, preventing extreme weather, and creates the tides in the oceans.

Answer: Water

Humans and all known life forms must have water to stay well and thrive. As we travel deeper into space, and explore our planets more closely, we need to know which has water, or ever did or could. We wonder if some forms of life may exist in space, such as in oceans covered with ice. These would be very different from any life we know on Earth.

In October, 2024 NASA sent the Europa Clipper on a journey to Jupiter's icy moon Europa, to arrive in 2030. We hope to discover whether there is water underneath the surface ice, and if it could support life. We call this search for life in space astrobiology. We have learned that there is water vapor, water molecules and very old, dry river beds too. Mars has polar ice caps and possibly water deep underground, and we know comets contain ice, and stars contain water as a gas.

Answer: A Golden Record

In 1977 we launched the space probe Voyager 1, which left our solar system and entered "interstellar space" in 2012. It was still sending us data in 2025, but eventually it will continue alone in a cold, dark and deep space, perhaps for thousands of years. In about 40,000 it will pass the star Gliese 445 in the constellation Camelopardalis,17.1 light-years from Earth. A light-year is 5.88 trillion miles (9.46 trillion kilometers).

Voyager 1 is the guardian of a very special audiovisual disc, a Golden Record. On it are pictures of the Earth and humans, audio greetings in different languages and many sounds, like whales, babies, the ocean and music. Just in case some Alien out there encounters Voyager 1 and is able to understand this disc, to learn what creatures we are, who ventured so far from home.