{"id":1464,"date":"2022-08-23T15:19:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-23T15:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/physicsastronomy\/?p=1464"},"modified":"2025-02-26T13:37:26","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T13:37:26","slug":"showcasing-the-first-jwst-observations-of-jupiter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/physicsastronomy\/2022\/08\/23\/showcasing-the-first-jwst-observations-of-jupiter\/","title":{"rendered":"Showcasing the First JWST Observations of Jupiter"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Scientists who revealed stunning views of Jupiter with the new \u00a310 billion James Webb Space Telescope talk to the BBC Sky at Night about their hopes that more planets will soon give up their secrets<\/em><\/strong>

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Ground-breaking infrared images of Jupiter have been revealed this week as part of a programme of giant planet observations by the world-famous space telescope.

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Image credit NASA, European Space Agency, Jupiter Early Release Science team. Image processing Judy Schmidt<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Professor Leigh Fletcher, of the Planetary Science Group at the University of Leicester and Space Park Leicester, is leading part of the space telescope\u2019s giant planet observations programme. Professor Fletcher described the giant planets programme on the August episode of the BBC Sky at Night, which can be viewed here<\/a>.


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Leigh Fletcher being interviewed at the School of Physics and Astronomy in July 2022.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n



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He said: \u201cThis incredible telescope was built to study the early universe and the distant cosmos, but it\u2019s also a fantastic new tool for planetary science and exploring our solar system.

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\u201cJupiter is a big, bright, rotating and moving target that makes it a supreme challenge for observations. Indeed, it\u2019s so bright that it often saturates all our detectors. We were therefore delighted to see the amazing quality of the NIRCAM images.

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\u201cThese new images have revealed bright storms of fresh ice on Jupiter, bands of different reflectivity, the swirling Great Red Spot and the auroral lightshow on both poles of the planet. We\u2019ve never seen Jupiter in so much incredible detail before.

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\u201cThis is incredibly exciting and over the next year we\u2019ll be undertaking observations of Saturn, Uranus and Neptune as well as more observations of Jupiter. We can\u2019t wait to see what we discover next.\u201d

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Professor Fletcher and his team work primarily with the spectroscopic instruments on the space telescope, namely its Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) and Near Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec). The Leicester team is part of the international consortium that released the breath-taking NIRCAM images this week.

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The Planetary Science Group at Leicester has a wealth of expertise in exploring the giant planets, from their churning atmospheres to their auroral lightshows and the surfaces of their diverse and potentially-habitable satellites.

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Reacting to the new images, STFC Webb Fellow Dr Henrik Melin, an expert in planetary ionospheres in the Planetary Science Group, said \u201cAmazing \u2013 does it get any better than this? This is only the very beginning of planetary science with JWST.\u201d

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The space telescope programme follows the group\u2019s work on the Cassini mission to Saturn, the Juno mission to Jupiter and the forthcoming European Space Agency (ESA) JUICE mission to Jupiter\u2019s satellites.

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The University of Leicester\u2019s \u00a3100 million space research and innovation facility, Space Park Leicester, is also part of the WebbUK consortium.

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At the beginning of July, it was one of only a handful of venues chosen by ESA to showcase the very first images to emerge from the space telescope. They included the best view yet of distant galaxies and light from 13 billion years ago.

The Sky at Night episode was mentioned in the August edition of Radio Times magazine:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Honorable mention in the @RadioTimes<\/a> for the August @BBCStargazing<\/a> episode on #JWST<\/a>, partly filmed here @PhysicsUoL<\/a> – who needs fancy CGI anyway? pic.twitter.com\/zC1TTkOJgf<\/a><\/p>— Leigh Fletcher (@LeighFletcher) August 30, 2022<\/a><\/blockquote>