Geekery: Juno Provides an Amazing Look at Jupiter
The most recent images from Juno are gorgeous and reveal more about the planet’s magnetic field.
Juno was launched in 2011 and entered Jupiter’s orbit summer of last year. The pass it made of Jupiter last August have produced some amazing images – that have created some new questions about the planet. Namely: the densely packed giant, swirling storms at the poles. Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator, had this to say about the new finding:
“We’re puzzled as to how they could be formed, how stable the configuration is, and why Jupiter’s north pole doesn’t look like the south pole. We’re questioning whether this is a dynamic system, and are we seeing just one stage, and over the next year, we’re going to watch it disappear, or is this a stable configuration and these storms are circulating around one another?”
Read the full release from NASA here for more on the scientific findings.
Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran used the new photos and info from NASA to create these videos that give an idea of what it might be like to orbit the massive planet…
Next up on Juno’s to check out list: Jupiter’s giant red spot.