University of Toronto (UofT) AST 101 The Sun and Its Neighbours Practice Exam

Rocky bodies that orbit the Sun and are typically found between Mars and Jupiter are called asteroids. This term fits because these objects are small rocky fragments that occupy the region known as the asteroid belt, a zone between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter where gravity from Jupiter prevented them from coalescing into a planet.

Meteoroids are much smaller particles in space, not the larger rocky bodies in that belt. Dwarf planets are sizable bodies that orbit the Sun and have enough mass to be spherical but haven’t cleared their neighborhoods, and they aren’t defined by being between Mars and Jupiter. Comets are icy bodies from the outer solar system that develop tails when they approach the Sun.