What is an Asteroid?

 

Definition of an Asteroid: Small, usually irregularly shaped body orbiting the sun, most often at least partially between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Ceres is the largest asteroid (diameter: 470 mi/750 km) and was the first discovered (1801). Of the more than 2,000 asteroids known, most have been discovered photographically; their paths appear as short lines in a time exposure. Asteroids may be fragments of a planet shattered in the remote past; material that failed to condense into a single planet; or material from the nuclei of old comets. What is a meteor? Space Science Solar System Earth Sun Moon