Jupiter's Wonders and Striking Conclusions

Last night, under crystal clear skies, I set up my Celestron nexstar SLT 130 telescope with the purpose of viewing Mars and Saturn. Of course, the view of Saturn's rings was breathtaking, but I've always found Jupiter to be of particular interest. The common known facts are: Jupiter is the largest planet (but did you know you could fit every planet combined in it twice?!)and it being fifth from the sun, both of which are contributing factors to my curiosity, but there's more to Jupiter than meets the eye, or should I say the giant red dot.

After I headed inside for the night, the acrylic painting like planet fresh in my mind, I researched a bit about Jupiter. On NASA's website there's a page dedicated to Jupiter with stats that are constantly changing like the distance from the sun (I swear they have it down to the second). You can determine its' position by the numbers and see if it's leaning towards the perihelion or aphelion. (It's cool, I'd check it out. Link at end of article per usual.)

We seem to be finding "striking" new information about Jupiter all the time like the odd Jovian lightning. Scientists have been wondering about it since NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft flew past Jupiter in 1979. Scientists theorized the lightning's existence but it couldn't be confirmed until that encounter. The discovery of this continuous lightning was profound but not quite as shocking as some of its' known characteristics such as its' radio signals.The lightning signals recorded for data purposes didn't match the radio signals emmited from lightning on earth. At least until 2 Juno instruments were sent there to gather more conclusive and detailed evidence. The instruments were the Waves plasma and radio wave detector and the Microwave Radiometer. The Waves instrument found that the rates (4 strikes per second) on Jupiter were very similar to Earth's. The Microwave Radiometer picked up high energy sferics that Voyager 1 couldn't. These sferics were the primary reason the lightning was different from Earth's, so the discovery was a huge advancement. Unfortunately, solving these two mysteries opened up the doors to new questions to replace the old ones. Like why the lightning seems to mostly strike near the poles and occur more frequently in the northern hemisphere. As of now we're just not sure exactly what's going on, but we plan on finding out with further experimentation.

Lightning on Jupiter

Photo Credit: Space.com no copyright infringement is intended

Speaking of storms, the giant red dot. A remnant of the ever diminishing storm that brewed on the planet for at least 400 years. (We aren't sure exactly how long the dot has been there but we saw it through a telescope for the first time 350 years ago). The spot is growing smaller and smaller and is predicted to completely vanish in around 20 years. It's difficult to imagine the iconic spot being gone but even more troubling is why the storm lasted this long. You see, Jupiter's jet streams move at speeds over 300 mph, so, in turn, if a storm is moving opposite the direction of the orbit of the planet the force imparted is very great resulting in a sort of vortex being fed with momentum. These high speed forces make sense considering the equivalent of one earth year is 4,333 days on Jupiter. But alas, the storm is coming to a close and a new Jupiter will be remembered by a new generation. We can't be 100% sure the storm will end in 20 years but the majority of scientists aren't counting on it being here for much longer. Regardless, Jupiter is a beautiful planet and it's bands will always be a supreme sight.

Jupiter has many more interesting qualities, its' atmosphere, composition, but what we do know is absolutely fascinating and we're excited to find out more about the gaseous planet. Next time you're out on a glassy night, and the whole universe seems to be at peace, slow and boring, just remember, everything's in motion, the stars, the storms, and our cosmos is nothing short of busy excitement. Calculated chaos. And if space won't slow for us, it's our job to keep up. Clear skies my friends.

Links: https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/jupiter/overview/

Websites linked are not sponsored, just observed by me an recommended for cool space stuff!