All hail the king of planets and its many mysteries.
Quite a few spacecraft orbited or flew by Jupiter up to now 5 many years. The primary had been Pioneer 10 Pioneer 11 Voyager 1 Voyager 2 Galileo spacecraft NASA Juno
Primarily based on a previous interview with Juno principal investigator Scott Bolton and information (opens in new tab) from the European Area Company (ESA), listed here are 10 mysteries we’ve about Jupiter that could be solved with extra research. Fortunately, two extra missions will head out that manner very quickly: NASA’s Europa JUICE
In Photographs: Juno’s amazing views of Jupiter
How did Jupiter get enriched in heavy components, in contrast with the sun?
Highly effective storms across the north pole of Jupiter captured by NASA’s Juno mission. (Picture credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Picture processing by Brian Swift )
Jupiter is 317 occasions extra huge than the Earth the sun
One concept (proposed on the time by Galileo scientists) is that Jupiter’s heavy elements come from the quite a few comets asteroids four times farther away
Associated: This jaw-dropping Jupiter photo is a photographer’s sharpest ever and made of 600,000 images
2. What’s the international abundance of water in Jupiter?
The distribution of water in Jupiter’s stratosphere as seen by the Herschel Area Telescope. (Picture credit score: Water map: ESA/Herschel/T. Cavalié et al.; Jupiter picture: NASA/ESA/Reta Beebe (New Mexico State College))
Water is essential to understanding how Jupiter was shaped. Water ice hitchhiking on early comets or asteroids introduced heavier components to Jupiter apart from the unique hydrogen and helium floating round within the solar system, in keeping with the Southwest Research Institute (opens in new tab)
A stunning latest discovering is simply how persistent water might be after a comet crashes into Jupiter. A well-known comet known as Shoemaker-Levy 9 broke up into items earlier than peppering the planet in July 1994. About 20 years later, the Herschel Area Observatory detected an abundance of water in Jupiter’s stratosphere that got here from Shoemaker-Levy 9
No less than one Juno research discovered a stunning quantity of water in Jupiter in comparison with what fashions prompt. Water could make up about 0.25% of the atmospheric molecules over Jupiter’s equator, a lot greater than earlier measurements from Galileo. Determining why the 2 spacecraft have totally different estimates is essential to raised decide the recipe for planet formation, NASA officials said (opens in new tab) on the time.
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3. What’s the nature of Jupiter’s core?
This view of Jupiter’s south pole was created utilizing information from NASA’s Juno spacecraft. (Picture credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gabriel Fiset)
The physics of Jupiter are onerous for even space electrons 2011 NASA feature story (opens in new tab) .
This course of creates an enormous magnetic area inside the planet, which can be strengthened by Jupiter’s fast rotation. Auroras
Juno goals to determine extra about Jupiter’s insides by analyzing the planet’s ambiance, gravity “fuzzy” core
Associated: What is Jupiter made of?
4. How deep do the zones, belts and storm options, such because the Pink Spot, go?
A flake of pink peels away from Jupiter’s Nice Pink Spot throughout an encounter with a smaller anticyclone, as seen by the Juno spacecraft’s excessive decision JunoCam on 12 February 2019. Though the collisions seem violent, planetary scientists imagine they’re largely floor results. (Picture credit score: AGU/Journal of Geophysical Analysis: Planets)
Pictures of Jupiter present thick stripes and swirling storms, however most of those photos seize solely the tops of the clouds that cowl the enormous planet. It is unclear what the climate is like deeper down, inside Jupiter, and whether or not the options that may be seen on the floor are current beneath. Juno observations recommend that is indeed the case
Understanding the long-term climate on Jupiter can even assist scientists remedy mysteries akin to why its Great Red Spot
In images: The Great Red Spot: The solar system’s biggest storm
5. How does the inside of Jupiter rotate?
NASA’s Juno spacecraft imaged Jupiter and Ganymede in the course of the mission’s fortieth shut go by the enormous planet on Feb. 25, 2022. (Picture credit score: Picture information: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Picture processing by Thomas Thomopoulos © CC BY)
If you take a look at the outside of Jupiter, you possibly can see that the zones and bands do not transfer in live performance with one another. There are adjustments of their rotation and sizes from night time to nighttime, adjustments which are even obvious in novice telescopes.
Deeper down in Jupiter’s atmosphere according to NASA (opens in new tab) , which is reverse to how one would count on gases to behave.
Determining the transition between the floor, fluid climate into this zone can be a process for Juno in its last years, as the inside of Jupiter could also be indicative of the construction at Saturn
Associated: Jupiter’s atmosphere, composition and the Great Red Spot
6. How and the place does the magnetic area originate?
Artist’s impression of the aurora on Jupiter, and its magnetosphere. (Picture credit score: JAXA)
The magnetic fields discovered round planets like Earth are regarded as brought on by the circulate of liquids inside the core (within the case of Earth, the fluid is iron). Issues are extra sophisticated on Jupiter, nevertheless.
The planet has liquid hydrogen nearer to its heart that might additionally conduct, very like a metallic, however findings from Juno recommend the inside has a vast asymmetry (opens in new tab) between the northern and southern hemispheres; why is open to interpretation. In the meantime, alternating currents (opens in new tab) of magnetism deep inside Jupiter could also be driving forceful auroras seen excessive within the ambiance.
Determining what is occurring in Jupiter couldn’t solely assist us perceive magnetism in large planets in our personal solar system, however might additionally assist scientists make predictions about planets exterior the solar system. Jupiter is taken into account a mannequin for exoplanet stars
Associated: Behold this fantastic 3D animation of Jupiter’s frosting-like clouds
7. What drives the aurora in Jupiter?
X-ray auroras on Jupiter, seen by the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, are overlaid right here on an optical picture from the Hubble Area Telescope taken on the identical time. (Picture credit score: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SwRI/R.Gladstone et al.; Optical: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage)
Jupiter’s auroras had been first noticed when the Voyager 1 spacecraft flew by in 1979. When astronomers later turned X-ray telescopes towards the planet, nevertheless, they noticed far more energy than anticipated. Auroras are so frequent on Jupiter, in actual fact, that in a 2007 news release astronomers stated they see the auroras each time they take a look at the enormous planet.
The method for producing these fields, nevertheless, is poorly understood, NASA added in the identical launch. Scientists know that Jupiter has sufficient spin to supply its personal auroras (not like the Earth, which depends absolutely on solar exercise). In addition they know the auroras come from charged particles, primarily (in Jupiter’s case) from volcanic plumes on the moon Io. Nevertheless it’s unclear how the particles make their manner from Io
Nearer research can be required by the Juno spacecraft, however nice progress has already been made: X-ray flares utilizing Io’s particles within the ambiance are generated by vibrations
Associated: Auroras, lightning and gings of Jupiter amaze in surprising NASA Juno photos
8. Might there be life in Jupiter’s system?
A extremely stylized view of Jupiter’s icy moon Europa created by reprocessing a picture captured by JunoCam in the course of the mission’s shut flyby on Sept. 29. (Picture credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS. Picture processing: Kevin M. Gill / Fernando Garcia Navarro)
Whereas Jupiter is probably going too hostile for all times as we all know it, its moons may be a unique matter. The gas giant is surrounded by quite a few icy moons, the biggest and most well-known being Europa, Ganymede Callisto
JUICE will goal a number of of those moons in its orbits, whereas Europa Clipper will largely (however not completely) look at Europa. The hope is these spacecraft will research the moons’ potential for all times, together with their “hidden oceans, magnetism, heating processes, tidal results, orbits, floor exercise, cores and compositions, atmospheres and space environments,” ESA states
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9. How has Jupiter’s complicated atmosphere formed its moons, and vice versa?
From left, the Jovian moons Io, Europa and Ganymede based mostly on Juno spacecraft information. (Picture credit score: NASA / SwRI / MSSS / Alessandro G. Ceretti © CC BY)
Juno continues to boggle the thoughts with the findings about Jupiter’s gravity, inside and ambiance. As you possibly can see from the findings already introduced, the spacecraft usually contradicted previous outcomes or took science in a very separate route. Armed with this info, we will now flip to the moons to get a larger sense of how Jupiter’s strangeness adjustments and shapes the moons it hosts.
Among the mysteries requiring extra examination right here embrace higher understanding how high-energy particles circulate round moons like Io, the character of the moons’ auroras, and the way the magnetic area of Jupiter (which extends round its moons) is formed by the solar wind outlined by ESA (opens in new tab) .
The moons additionally form one another, by orbital resonances and stirring up tides on one another, which provides additional complexity to an already otherworldly system.
Associated: Jupiter’s weird magnetic field gets even weirder
10. How do fuel giants often type and evolve?
Jupiter and its moon Europa, left, are seen by the James Webb Area Telescope’s NIRCam instrument 2.12 micron filter. (Picture credit score: NASA, ESA, CSA, and B. Holler and J. Stansberry (STScI))
Whereas every planet is exclusive, what we’re discovering on Jupiter could also be consultant of different planets inside and outdoors of our solar system, particularly larger ones. Scientists are at the moment cataloging a spread of unbelievable worlds, lots of that are just a few occasions bigger than Jupiter and which have a brand new instrument to take a look at them: the James Webb Space Telescope
Webb has sharp infrared imaging accessible and one in all its bigger objectives is to catalog planetary atmospheres to raised perceive what they’re manufactured from, and the way they might change over time. The research nearer up at Jupiter assist to tell what scientists are seeing additional out, to enhance their fashions of how planets type, evolve and proceed altering in numerous sorts of planetary programs.
Associated: 10 amazing exoplanet discoveries
References European Area Company. (2022, March 23.) Exploring the secrets and techniques of Jupiter: Prime 5 mysteries JUICE will remedy. https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Juice/Exploring_the_secrets_of_Jupiter_Top_five_mysteries_Juice_will_solve (opens in new tab)
Moore, Kimberly M. et. al. (2018, Sept. 5). A fancy dynamo inferred from the hemispheric dichotomy of Jupiter’s magnetic area. Nature 561, no. 76-78. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0468-5 (opens in new tab)
Mura, A. et. al. (2021, July 3). “Oscillations and stability of Jupiter polar cyclones. Geophysical Analysis Letters 48, no. 14. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2021GL094235 (opens in new tab)
NASA. (2011, Aug. 9). A freaky fluid inside Jupiter? https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2011/09aug_juno3/ (opens in new tab)
NASA. (2018, March 7.) NASA Juno findings: Jupiter’s jet-streams are unearthly. https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-juno-findings-jupiter-s-jet-streams-are-unearthly (opens in new tab)
NASA. (2020, Feb. 20). “Findings from NASA’s Juno replace Jupiter water thriller.” https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/findings-from-nasas-juno-update-jupiter-water-mystery (opens in new tab)
Southwest Analysis Institute. (2022.) Mission Juno. https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu (opens in new tab)
Yao, Zhonghua et. al. (2021, July 9.) “Revealing the supply of Jupiter’s x-ray auroral flares.” Science Advances 7, no. 28. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abf0851 (opens in new tab)
Elizabeth Howell is the co-author of “ Why Am I Taller (opens in new tab) ?” (ECW Press, 2022; with Canadian astronaut Dave Williams), a e book about space medication. Comply with her on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab) . Comply with us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Facebook (opens in new tab) .
