What terms of measurement is used for the distances for planets?

Question

My friend is taking Astronomy and one of her questions is "What terms of measurement is used to measure the distances between planets?" Thanks so much for you!

Answer 1

Well, one unit is the au (astronomical unit). it is the mean distance to the Earth from the sun - 93,000,000 miles.

Answer 2

AU (astronomical unit)

1 AU = 149,597,870 kilometers =  93 million miles

That's approximately the mean distance between the Earth and the Sun

Answer 3

In our solar system, distances are often measured in astronautical units (AU).  For example, the Jet Propulsion Labs has a web site that will give you the precise locations and speeds of the planets, and they use AU's.

For the distances to other stars, astronomers mostly use parsecs.  One parsec = 3.26 light-years, generally.  For very far distances of more than a few million parsecs, the calibration is a little bit uncertain.

For newspapers and popular magazines, parsecs are translated to light-years.  But for professional purposes, astronomers use parsecs.

Answer 4

AUs aka Astronomical Units are used for this measurement. they each equal 93 million miles. For example, Earth is one AU away from the sun and Neptune is 9 AUs away from the sun.

Answer 5

Planets in this solar system it is AU. From here to other stars it is LY

Answer 6

The most common term is Nautical Miles.  For faraway galaxies and planets, they use lightyears.  You can go to the nasa website to get more terms.

Answer 7

AU

astronomical unit

~ earths distance from the sun

lesser used term is light minutes, ~16% of an AU