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An image of NASA's Juno probe shows three small waves in the north-equatorial belt of Jupiter, a dark band north of the planet's equator. The JunoCam instrument of the spacecraft captured this view during its fourth close flyby of the planet on February 2, 2017.
Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS / JunoCam
KNOXVILLE, Tennessee – Jupiter and Earth may look like two completely different planets, but the atmosphere of these planets seems to have something in common, revealed new images of NASA's Juno mission.
NASA 's Juno spacecraft, which orbits Jupiter since 2016, captured images of small – scale wave patterns in Jupiter' s atmosphere during a series of close – up fly – bys called "perioves". . Imagined with the probe's JunoCam instrument, these small waves have a certain resemblance to the cloud formations present on Earth.
Juno's images and data were revealed here at the 50th meeting of the Planetary Science Division (DPS) of the American Astronomical Society. "We have discovered a very large number of very small waves in the atmosphere," said Glenn Orton, a researcher at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, at a press conference Monday (October 22nd). [In Photos: Juno’s Amazing Views of Jupiter]
"These mid-scale waves are generally called in the Earth's atmosphere," said Orton. On Jupiter, these "atmospheric wave trains" are "dominant atmospheric structures that trail one after the other as they survey the planet, most of them concentrating near the Jupiter's equator," they said. NASA officials in a statement.
These wave functions were first seen by NASA's two Voyager missions during their flight with Jupiter in 1979 and again in 1996 when the agency's Galileo probe circled the planet. . Now, Juno has found the same type of waves, but the wave peaks are much closer than those observed on previous missions.
Four images of NASA's Juno probe show different types of small-scale atmospheric waves on Jupiter. The most typical waves are parallel to the equator (as in the A-picture), but they can sometimes tilt in different directions and even form curves.
Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS / JunoCam
The small-scale waves recently represented by Juno are spaced 55 to 270 km apart, while those of Galileo and Voyagers show waves 68 to 190 km apart.
"Just as we see in the earth's atmosphere, we have some kind of disruption of [Jupiter’s] said Orton. We see a material as water that condenses into a cloud. On Jupiter, it would likely be ammonia, a high level condensate in the atmosphere. "
Jovian waves seem to behave much like gravity waves in the Earth's atmosphere (not to be confused with gravitational waves), said Orton. "These things fall back into equilibrium, then they go back up and swing, and every time you see that summit, you see condensation in the Earth's atmosphere." By measuring the shadow of one of the waves, the researchers determined that it was about 10 km above the clouds in the background.
Here on Earth, these wavy clouds form over rising storm currents and other disturbances that can disrupt the flow of air into the atmosphere. Some of the waves encountered in Jupiter's atmosphere look like cyclones on Earth with "ray-like" elements, Orton explained, comparing an image of JunoCam and a satellite image of Hurricane Irma.
NASA's satellite imagery shows atmospheric gravitational waves on the Earth.
Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS
NASA officials have stated that "most waves should be atmospheric gravity waves", scientists are still analyzing the data and have not yet confirmed it.
While scientists are working to determine exactly what creates these waves on Jupiter, they are also trying to explain why these waves are not always present. After the Voyagers discovered the waves for the first time, there were times when the missions saw no wave on the planet. Until now, Juno has been able to see these waves during each close flyby of Jupiter.
In this image of NASA 's Juno probe, a cloud formation in the atmosphere of Jupiter looks like a hurricane on Earth.
Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS / JunoCam and NOAA
A lack of waves at any time may indicate that Jupiter's atmosphere is static, said Orton. When the waves are present, they can give clues to what is happening deeper in the atmosphere of Jupiter.
Email Hanneke Weitering at [email protected] or follow her. @hannekescience. Follow us on twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook. Original article on Space.com.
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