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The large ones, bigger than say 400 kilometers in radius, are round because the amount of mass present produces such a strong gravitational field that most substances such as rock become very plastic. But, if the planet is too close to its sun, or if a satellite is too close to its parent planet, the shapes can be very out-of-round due to tidal effects. The above image is of the asteroid Vesta taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. It has a diameter of 525 kilometers and at this size you can see that large objects already have a noticeably round shape to them. The telescope photographed the asteroid while it was rotating and above you can see four of the views from the 'movie'

The large ones, bigger than say 400 kilometers in radius, are round because the amount of mass present produces such a strong gravitational field that most substances such as rock become very plastic. But, if the planet is too close to its sun, or if a satellite is too close to its parent planet, the shapes can be very out-of-round due to tidal effects.

The above image is of the asteroid Vesta taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. It has a diameter of 525 kilometers and at this size you can see that large objects already have a noticeably round shape to them. The telescope photographed the asteroid while it was rotating and above you can see four of the views from the 'movie'

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12y ago

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