Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system and the fifth planet from the sun. The gas giant has a long, rich, history of surprising scientists.

Named after the kind of the gods in Roman mythology this "king of the planets" is a stormy enigma shrouded in colorful clouds. Its most prominent and most famous storm, the Great Red Spot, is twice the width of Earth.

Jupiter helped to revolutionize the way we saw the universe — and our place in it — in 1610 when Galileo discovered Jupiter's four large moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. These observations were the first time that celestial bodies were seen circling an object other than Earth and supported the Copernican view that Earth was not the center of the universe.

Jupiter is more than twice as massive as all the other planets combined, according to NASA. Jupiter's immense volume could hold more than 1,300 Earths. If Jupiter were the size of a basketball, Earth would be the size of a grape.

Jupiter was probably the first planet to form in the solar system, made up of gasses left over from the formation of the sun. If the planet had been about 80 times more massive during its development, it would have actually become a star in its own right, according to NASA.

On average, Jupiter orbits at about 483,682,810 miles (778,412,020 kilometers) from the sun. That's 5.203 times farther than Earth's average distance from the sun.

Enviroment

Jupiter's atmosphere resembles that of the sun, made up mostly of hydrogen and helium. A helium-rich layer of fluid metallic hydrogen envelops a “fuzzy” or partially-dissolved core at the center of the planet.

The colorful light and dark bands that surround Jupiter are created by strong east-west winds in the planet's upper atmosphere traveling more than 335 mph (539 km/h). The white clouds in the light zones are made of crystals of frozen ammonia, while darker clouds made of other chemicals are found in the dark belts. At the deepest visible levels are blue clouds. Far from being static, the stripes of clouds change over time.

Inside the atmosphere, diamond rain may fill the skies, and hidden deep within the atmosphere is a dense core of unknown composition.

Jupiter's gargantuan magnetic field is the strongest of all the planets in the solar system, at nearly 20,000 times the strength of Earth's, according to the University of Colorado at Boulder(opens in new tab).

THE GREAT RED SPOT

One of Jupiter's most famous features is the Great Red Spot, a giant hurricane-like storm that's lasted more than 300 years. According to NASA, the Great Red Spot at its widest is about twice the size of Earth, and its edge spins counterclockwise around its center at speeds of about 270 to 425 mph (430 to 680 kph). That counterclockwise spin makes it a type of storm called an "anticyclone."

The color of the storm, which usually varies from brick red to slightly brown, may come from small amounts of sulfur and phosphorus in the ammonia crystals in Jupiter's clouds. The spot has been shrinking for quite some time, although the rate may be slowing in recent years.

JUPITER'S MOONS

Jupiter has a mind-boggling 79 known moons, mostly named after the paramours and descendants of the Roman god of the same name. The four largest moons of Jupiter called Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, were discovered by Galileo Galilei and so are sometimes called the Galilean moons.

Ganymede is the largest moon in our solar system, and is larger than both Pluto and Mercury. It is also the only moon known to have its own magnetic field

Io is the most volcanically active body in our solar system. As Io orbits Jupiter, the planet's immense gravity causes "tides" in Io's solid surface that rise 300 feet (100 meters) high and generate enough heat to spur on volcanism.

Europa is made up mostly of water ice, and it may hide a liquid ocean that contains twice as much water as Earth's oceans do. Some of this liquid spouts from out of Europa's southern pole in sporadic plumes, and in 2021 the Hubble Space Telescope spotted more water vapor above Europa's surface.

Callisto has the lowest reflectivity, or albedo, of the four Galilean moons. This suggests that its surface may be composed of dark, colorless rock. Once considered a boring counterpart to the other Galilean moons, Callisto's heavily-cratered surface might conceal a secret ocean, according to NASA.

JUPITER'S RINGS

Jupiter's three faint rings came as a surprise when NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft discovered them around the planet's equator in 1979. Much more tenuous than Saturn's chunky, colorful rings, Jupiter's rings are made of continuous streams of dust particles emitted by some of the planet's moons, according to NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

EXPLORING JUPITER

Historically, seven missions have flown by Jupiter — Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 1, Voyager 2, Ulysses, Cassini and New Horizons. Only two missions — NASA's Galileo and Juno — have orbited the planet.

Pioneer 10 revealed how dangerous Jupiter's radiation belt is, while Pioneer 11 provided data on the Great Red Spot and close-up pictures of Jupiter's polar regions. Voyagers 1 and 2 helped astronomers create the first detailed maps of the Galilean satellites, discovered Jupiter's rings, revealed sulfur volcanoes on Io and detected lightning in Jupiter's clouds. Ulysses discovered that the solar wind has a much greater impact on Jupiter's magnetosphere than scientists previously thought. New Horizons took close-up pictures of Jupiter and its largest moons.

Jupiter's first orbiter, Galileo, arrived in 1995 and soon sent a probe plunging toward Jupiter, making the first direct measurements of the planet's atmosphere and measuring the amount of water and other chemicals there. Then the main spacecraft spent eight years studying the system.

LIFE ON JUPITER?

Jupiter's atmosphere grows warmer with depth, reaching room temperature, or 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius), at an altitude where the atmospheric pressure is about 10 times as great as it is on Earth. Scientists suspect that if Jupiter has any form of life, it would have to be airborne at this level. Theoretically, a 2021 study found, that there is enough water to support some life. However, researchers have found no evidence of life on Jupiter.

Jupiter's moons are a different story: Europa in particular could host a radiation-shielded hidden ocean, and marine life might float somewhere in those alien waters.

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  • President_Obama [they/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

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