Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system and the fifth planet from the sun. The gas giant features beautifully striped cloud layers. a set of dusty thin rings; the famous Great Red Spot; And dozens of assorted satellites.
How did Jupiter get its name?
As the fourth brightest object in the sky on Earth – after him the sunAnd the moon And Venus Jupiter has been known since ancient times. Our modern name for the planet is derived from the king of the Roman gods, Jupiter.
To the ancient Greeks, Jupiter was known as Phaethon, which means “glowing star,” while the Babylonians referred to the giant planet as Marduk, the patron deity of Babylon. Other ancient names for Jupiter include Brhaspati (Sanskrit), Tzedek (Hebrew), Muxing (meaning “wood star” in Mandarin), and Mushtari (Arabic), According to the nine planets.
What is Jupiter made of?
Jupiter is two and a half times more massive than all the other planets in the United States Solar System combined, consisting mainly of hydrogen and helium, According to the European Southern Observatory. The gas giant has a diameter of 88,846 miles (142,984 kilometers), which makes it 11 times larger than Earth, According to NASA.
Jupiter has no real surface, according to the agency; The planet is just a swirling mixture of gases flowing in three distinct layers at its outer edges. This area is thought to span approximately 44 miles (71 km), with the upper layer likely made of ammonia ice, the middle layer likely made of ammonium hydrosulfide crystals and the inner layer likely composed of water and steam ice.
The bright bands of colors seen on Jupiter’s outer surface are likely plumes of gases containing sulfur and phosphorous rising from the warmer planet’s interior. As the planet rotates so rapidly, completing one day in less than 10 hours, its outer atmosphere is separated into long belts of brighter and darker matter, like an extreme version of Landjet streams.
Storms can persist in Jupiter’s atmosphere for many years and may extend 60 miles (100 km) within it. The famous Great Red Spot is one storm that has lasted at least 300 years, and data from NASA’s Juno probe indicates that the storm Go down about 300 miles (480 km) in the planet’s atmosphere – or about 40 times the depth of the Mariana Trench on Earth.
The Great Red Spot has been seen Eat other smaller stormsScientists believe that when some hurricanes hit the spot, they increase their speed, and possibly extend their lifespan. Near the south pole of Jupiter, astronomers have found a Dramatic hexagonal storm About the size of Texas surrounded by six other swirling floats.
Data from Juno has shown that Jupiter’s jet streams may reach depths of up to 2,000 miles (about 3,200 km), According to NASA. Deep in the atmosphere, increasing pressures and temperatures compress hydrogen gas into a liquid, which means Jupiter has the largest ocean in the solar system, one made of hydrogen instead of water, According to NASA.
Somewhere about halfway to the gas giant’s center, the internal pressures become so great that electrons are squeezed out of the original hydrogen atoms, creating a superconducting metal thought to drive Jupiter’s massive magnetic field, according to the agency. The planet may have a central core of a dense solid or “soup”, made primarily of iron and silicon, that can reach about 90,000 degrees Fahrenheit (50,000 degrees Celsius).
How far is Jupiter from the sun?
According to NASA, Jupiter orbits at an average distance of 484 million miles (778 million km) from the Sun. A year on Jupiter lasts 11.86 Earth years.
The planet has the shortest day in the Solar System, lasting 9.93 breezy hours. Its central axis tilts only 3 degrees, in contrast to Earth’s axial tilt of 23 degrees, which means that Jupiter does not experience significant seasonal change throughout the year.
Did humans discover Jupiter?
Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei was one of the first people to make detailed observations of Jupiter, as he gazed at the planet through his telescope in 1610, and saw its four largest moons, according to According to NASA. In the modern era, humans have launched many tentacles that have either flown or orbited around the gas giant.
The Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft, launched in March 1972 and April 1973, respectively, studied the asteroid belt and swept through Jupiter, collected information about intense radiation belts and captured some early images, according to sister site Live Science. Space.com.
The most impressive images had to wait until the Voyager 1 and 2 probes, both of which left Earth in 1977 and reached Jupiter in 1979, to capture stunning observations of the giant planet. Robots have discovered Jupiter’s faint and dusty ring system, the presence of volcanic activity on its moon Io and a few previously unknown moons.
NASA launched a mission dedicated to Jupiter called Galileo, which arrived and began orbiting the massive planet in December 1995. Galileo studied deeply the icy moon Europa, Io, and Jupiter and launched a probe that plunged into Jupiter’s atmosphere and took data on things like temperature, wind speed and pressure on the planet.
The agency’s newest dedicated Jupiter spacecraft is called Juno, which has been in orbit since July 2016. Juno passes over the planet’s polar regions every 53.5 days and has studied Its crazy strong magnetic cover and the bright aurora borealis, among others, since then.
NASA is building a probe called Europa Clipper to study the icy moon and its subsurface ocean, which many scientists believe could be a potential habitat for life. According to NASA. In addition, the European Space Agency’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission will explore Europe as well as two other large moons of Jupiter: Ganymede and Callisto.
How many moons does Jupiter have?
There are currently 53 named moons for Jupiter, with another 26 pending official names, according to According to NASA. Jupiter’s largest moon, GanymedeIt is the largest moon in the solar system and larger than Mercury.
The other satellites of Galilee – named after their discoverer – are also giant worlds with interesting surprises. Callisto is one of the most heavily drilled bodies in the Solar System and may contain a liquid ocean under its thick icy crust. Europe has a similar structure of ice and ocean, but its permafrost is much thinner, which means it is recycled more often and has fewer craters. Brightly colored Io is the most volcanically active object in the Solar System.
Could there be life on Jupiter?
Astronomer and science reporter Carl Sagan once speculated that jellyfish-like organisms could survive using helium gas in Jupiter’s atmosphere, but most researchers nowadays have little hope for the organisms flapping on the gas giant, according to nature.
NASA considers Jupiter’s moon Europa, encased in a shell of ice surrounding a massive body of liquid water, to be one of the The most likely places to find extraterrestrial life in the solar system. Europe may have Giant ice spikes on its surface, which makes landing on the frozen world difficult.
Additional Resources
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Coffield, C (2016, June 28). Up close and personal with Jupiter: the history of 9 space probes. Space.com website. https://www.space.com/33285-juno-history-of-jupiter-probes.html
European Southern Observatory. (second abbreviation). Jupiter. Retrieved on April 21, 2022 from https://www.eso.org/public/usa/images/b03/
Marghita, R.; (2021, October 29). NASA’s Juno: Science results provide the first 3D rendering of Jupiter’s atmosphere. NASA. https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-juno-science-results-offer-first-3d-view-of-jupiter-at Atmosphere
NASA. (2019, June 26). Europa: exploration. https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/moons/jupiter-moons/europa/exploration/?page=0&per_page=5&order=launch_date+desc%2Ctitle+asc&search=&tags=Europa&category=33
NASA. (2019, June 26). Jupiter: exploration. https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/jupiter/exploration/?page=0&per_page=10&order=launch_date+desc%2Ctitle+asc&search=&tags=Jupiter&category=33
NASA. (2021, October 30). Jupiter: in the depths. https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/jupiter/in-depth/
NASA. (second abbreviation). Jupiter’s Moons: Overview. Retrieved on April 21, 2022 from https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/moons/jupiter-moons/overview/?page=0&per_page=40&order=name+asc&search=&placeholder=Enter+moon+name&condition_1=9%3Aparent_id&condition_2=moon%3Abody_type%3Ailike&condition_3
The nine planets. (second abbreviation). Planetary Linguistics Facts. Retrieved on April 21, 2022 from https://nineplanets.org/planetary-linguistics.