Mercury,
Jan/Feb 2002 Table of Contents
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Image
courtesy of NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
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by
Caroline Seydel
Lightning,
raging winds, and planet-sized oval storms give Jupiter- researchers
a grand spectacle.
Jupiter's
wild weather and swirling clouds of gas have fascinated observers
for centuries. Since 1995, the Galileo spacecraft has given scientists
an unprecedented close-up of the planet and its equally intriguing
large moons. And in December 2000, the Cassini spacecraft flew by
Jupiter on its way to Saturn, adding a new dimension to Jupiter
observations. Using Galileo and Cassini data, planetary scientists
are revealing the nature of the processes that drive Jupiter's atmospheric
dynamics, adding more detail to the sketch provided by Voyager in
1979.
In
just the past three years, observers have watched two white oval
storms merge into one, collected evidence that thunderstorms drive
larger weather patterns, recorded the first known patch of pure
ammonia ice, and discovered that Jupiter's winds may swoop and soar
like a giant roller coaster. Each of these discoveries contributes
to an understanding of how energy, air currents, and chemistry interact
to produce an atmosphere quite unlike Earth's, yet driven by the
same basic processes: convection, evaporation, and condensation.
More
than twice as massive as all the other planets combined, and voluminous
enough to hold 1,400 Earths, Jupiter is about three-quarters hydrogen
and one-quarter helium by mass, with traces of methane, water, ammonia,
and probably a rocky core. Like a giant pressure cooker, the tremendous
mass heats Jupiter's core to a sweltering 30,000° C. As this
heat flows outward, it supplies abundant energy to sustain violent
weather.
Jupiter's
speedy 9.9-hour rotation separates the planet's winds into the colored
horizontal bands that make Jupiter so visually distinctive. Chemical
and temperature differences in the gases color the bands reddish-brown,
yellow, blue, and white. Each band flows at a different speed (and
sometimes opposite directions), generating turbulence between adjacent
bands that evolves into oval-shaped storms. Smaller vortices sometimes
develop into giant hurricane-like storms that can persist for centuries,
such as the 24,000-kilometer-wide Great Red Spot. These colorful
features make Jupiter a prime telescopic target, especially in times
like the present when Jupiter is near opposition.
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