Juno Mission unveils the depth and structure of planet’s shrinking red spot and colourful bands
Dr. Leigh Fletcher, Participating Scientist for the NASA’s Juno mission, reports on latest discoveries revealing the 3D structure of Jupiter’s deep atmosphere, in an article recently published on TheConversation. Further information can be found in press releases from JPL and from Leicester. Nasa’s Juno mission, the solar-powered robotic explorer of Jupiter, has completed its five-year prime mission to […]
Monitoring Jupiter’s Atmospheric Heartbeat over Three Decades
Long-term infrared monitoring of Jupiter’s equatorial stratosphere over three decades revealed a natural cycle of variable winds and temperatures. New research in Nature Astronomy by Antuñano et al. (2020, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1165-5) has found that this stratospheric cycle can be spectacularly disrupted by global upheavals happening far below. Jupiter, the largest planet of our Solar System, […]
Farewell to Cassini
Seven days left until we say farewell to @CassiniSaturn @CassiniNooo pic.twitter.com/Sx7ACHeKDa — Leigh Fletcher (@LeighFletcher) September 8, 2017 After almost twenty years in space, the Cassini spacecraft is now just seven days away from its final encounter with the giant planet, ending humankind’s first detailed exploration of the ringed planet. Cassini’s Grand Finale is the […]
Ten Facts about Jupiter’s Great Red Spot
In honour of Juno’s close encounter with Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS) on July 11th 2017, here are some quick facts about the Solar System’s most famous storm system: The Great Red Spot is a very long-lived spinning vortex: drawings show the GRS in the Victorian era, but it might have persisted for even […]
Earth-based observations prepare Juno for the Great Red Spot Encounter
In just a few days time, on July 11th 2017, NASA’s Juno spacecraft will perform the closest-ever views of the swirling maelstrom known as Jupiter’s Great Red Spot. It was always hoped that the pre-planned polar orbit and close perijove passes would take the spacecraft over the storm, but the slow and somewhat unpredictable westward […]
Juno’s first observations of Jupiter are revealing a giant world that is defying our expectations
[This is an extended version of an article that first appeared on the Conversation] Last month, planetary scientists from around the world met at the European Geophysical Union (EGU) conference in Vienna, and were treated to the first glimpse of long-awaited results from NASA’s Juno spacecraft. The atmosphere was one of surprise, excitement, and […]
The spacecraft that came before Juno
The Juno spacecraft is not the first to visit Jupiter – this honour goes to the Pioneer 10 spacecraft back in December of 1973. The planet has been visited by a total of eight spacecraft prior to the arrival of Juno in July of 2016. Out of these eight, only the Galileo spacecraft entered orbit, […]
What’s happening in Jupiter’s upper atmosphere down at the equator?
The northern and southern lights of Jupiter are a vibrant and dynamic phenomena, generated by a complex array of mechanisms that create the most powerful aurora in the solar system. There are many aspects of the Jovian aurora which remain to be discovered – something Juno will reveal during it’s time at Jupiter – but […]
First, wonderful, glimpse of Jupiter
Wow! The Juno spacecraft did not disappoint! The images released after Juno’s first science perijove are absolutely stunning. The one that grabbed me was this one: Jupiter’s southern infrared aurora as observed by Juno JIRAM (NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/ASI/INAF/JIRAM) It is the first image released from the Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM), an instrument contributed by the […]
The Jupiter Time Capsule
Given that we don’t yet know whether a planetary core exists within Jupiter, much of our understanding of giant planet formation comes from a different line of investigation: the bulk composition of the planet. The composition of the atmosphere that we observe today results from a combination of many processes – chemistry initiated […]
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