Jupiter is still astonishing and it in part is thanks to the NASA Juno mission which is supplying astronomers and researchers with a wide array of facts to unlock all the secrets behind largest planet of our Solar System.
Recently, 3 papers were released in Nature journal in response to a query that researchers are asking since Galileo took his first glimpse of Jupiter’s iconic stripes. Accordingly, astronomers are asking themselves if these colorful striations are only a nice topical event or they are a meaningful feature of Jupiter.
Examining the information gathered by NASA’s Juno craft, researchers were capable of uncovering that the bands are extended to a maximum height of approximately 3,000 km. That is considerably more than prior calculations.
NASA Juno probe is delivering an astonishing array of new information regarding Jupiter and everything that lies beyond the Jupiter’s crust. Between its readings, Juno has sent back home those regarding the gravitational field of Jupiter.
Jupiter is not a perfect sphere due to the super strong winds forming the renowned Jupiter’s stripes
As the gravity of the planet draws on the Juno probe at its overpass, the radio frequency signal also changes to some extent. This shift in radio waves, even though it is quite insignificant, is quantifiable. And because the air passageways are in separate locations every single time Juno orbits the gas giant planet, the scientists are capable of mapping the gravitational field in various places on Jupiter.
The wind streams around Jupiter are far more powerful than the most powerful winds on Earth and they have been around about a hundred years. As these jets circulate in stripes from East to West or vice versa, they disturb the homogeneous dispersion of Jupiter’s mass. By gauging the off-balance of the gravitational field of Jupiter, Juno’s examination instruments could measure the deepness of storms beneath the apparent surface of the gas giant.
The calculations revealed that Jupiter’s atmosphere represents 1% of the Jupiter’s mass. Also using NASA Juno mission, researchers searched for abnormalities and calculated that besides the Jupiter’s rotation speed which is known for causing the gas giant to be elliptical, even more disturbances in this regard are due to the before-mentioned strong winds which also form the colorful and astonishing Jupiter’s stripes.
