NASA’s Juno mission, which was
started in 2011 and initiated its first orbit last year, allows researchers to
view Jupiter in new ways thanks to the probe's extremely elliptical orbit,
which travels over the planet's poles and plunges within 5,000km (3,100 miles)
of its cloud tops.
Now the NASA probe has taken new images of the gas giant's hectic cyclones, which are up to 1,400km (870
miles) across, approximately the length of Japan.
A statement by NASA
described the planet as 'a complex, gigantic, turbulent world' that is far not
the same as researchers previously thought.
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This image shows Jupiter's South Pole [Jupiter from
bottom], as seen by NASA's Juno spacecraft from an altitude of 32,000 miles
(52,000 kilometers).
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Two research papers in the
journal Science and 44 research papers in Geophysical Research Letters explain
a trove of findings made since Juno started orbiting Jupiter last year.
Scott Bolton, Juno principal
investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, said:
“We knew, going in, that
Jupiter would throw us some curves. There is so much going on here that we
didn't expect that we have had to take a step back and begin to rethink of this
as a whole new Jupiter. Juno's findings are really going to force us to rethink
not only how Jupiter works, but how do we explore Saturn, Uranus and Neptune,”
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This sequence of enhanced-color images shows how quickly
the viewing geometry changes for NASA’s Juno spacecraft as it swoops by
Jupiter.
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With dozens of cyclones
hundreds of miles across - along with unidentifiable weather systems extending
thousands of miles - the poles look nothing like Jupiter's equatorial section,
directly identifiable by its strips and Great Red Spot, a raging hurricane-like
storm.
Bolton said: “That's the
Jupiter we've all known and grown to love. And when you look from the pole, it
looks totally different ... I don't think anybody would have guessed this is
Jupiter”
He calls these first main
discoveries 'Earth-shattering. Or should I say, Jupiter-shattering.
A look at Jupiter's poles
has shown they are covered with dozens of densely clustered storms, possibly
dropping hail or snow.
'Images of Jupiter's
previously-unseen poles show a chaotic scene of bright oval features,' said one
of the studies in the journal Science.
These ovals, it turns out,
are huge swirling storms, some of which measure up to 870 miles (1,400
kilometers) across.
Researchers found 'signs of
ammonia welling up from the deep atmosphere and forming giant weather systems.'
Now, more study is needed to
better understand the nature of Jupiter's storms, and why the planet acts this
way.
Meanwhile enjoy these
breathtaking view of the largest and one of the most mysterious planet of our
solar system.
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A cylindrical map of the infrared emission from Jupiter
as detected by the Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM), an instrument on the
Juno spacecraft
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| The complexity and richness of Jupiter's 'southern lights' are on display in this image of false-color maps from Nasa's Juno spacecraft |
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The huge aurora on Jupiter (pictured) are thought to be
caused by solar particles and volcanic debris in the space around the giant
planet being accelerated towards the poles by its powerful magnetic field
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