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# asteroid

«asteroid» in Mova's school dictionary: **a rocky or metal object in space, smaller than a planet…** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 5 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### part of speech

noun (an asteroid, asteroids)

### meaning for a pupil

1) An asteroid is a rocky or metal object in space, smaller than a planet, that goes around the Sun. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#m1)

2) Asteroids range from the size of a pebble or boulder to hundreds of kilometres across. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#m2)

### sense in the lessons

In science (space) most asteroids are in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Scientists think a huge asteroid that hit the Earth helped to wipe out the dinosaurs. A small piece that falls through the air and glows is a meteor; one that lands is a meteorite. Space agencies watch for asteroids that come near Earth.

### examples

- Most asteroids orbit the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x1)
- A giant asteroid may have caused the dinosaurs to die out. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x2)
- Some asteroids are as big as a city. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x3)
- Scientists track asteroids that come close to Earth. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x4)
- A spacecraft landed on an asteroid and collected dust. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x5)
- Asteroids are smaller than planets and moons. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/#x6)

### note

Countable. Asteroid, comet, meteor: an asteroid is rocky; a comet is icy and grows a tail near the Sun; a meteor is the streak of light («shooting star») when a small piece burns up in the air. A meteorite is a piece that reaches the ground.

### In the corpora

- [Crocodiles survived the asteroid too, and they are closer relatives of birds than of lizards.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/76-end-of-the-dinosaurs-and-birds/16/)
- [Scientists track big asteroids, and none of the known large ones will hit Earth in the next hundred years.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/271-the-asteroid-the-day-the-dinosaurs-died/13/)
- [In 2022 the DART spacecraft bumped into an asteroid and changed its path, a test of how to protect Earth.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/271-the-asteroid-the-day-the-dinosaurs-died/14/)
- [About 66 million years ago an asteroid about 10 km wide hit Mexico and ended the age of non-bird dinosaurs.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/geography/58-deep-time-and-the-story-of-life/17/)
- [The Moon is covered in craters, some hundreds of kilometres wide, made by asteroids and comets hitting it.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/6-the-moon/9/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «asteroid» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/asteroid/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.