The giant stormy planet Jupiter has gone through a makeover, as seen in these comparative Hubble Space Telescope images taken nearly 11 months apart. Several months ago the dark Southern Equatorial Belt (SEB) vanished. The last time this happened was in the early 1970s, when we didn't have powerful enough telescopes to study the change in detail.
Left
A Hubble picture from July 23, 2009, captures the planet's common appearance over the past several decades with alternating zones of high altitude ammonia ice crystal clouds (white strips) and belts of lower altitude material (dark strip). The image was taken to study a wispy patch of dark debris in the far Southern Hemisphere caused by the suspected explosion of an asteroid plunging into the lower atmosphere on July 19, 2009.
Right
A Hubble picture from June 7, 2010, reveals a slightly higher altitude layer of white ammonia ice crystal clouds that appears to obscure the deeper, darker belt clouds of the SEB. The team predicts that these clouds should clear out in a few months.
Hubble also resolved a string of dark spots farther south of the vanished belt. Based on past observations, the Hubble Jupiter team expects to see similar spots appear in the SEB, right before its white clouds clear out in a few months.
These natural color comparative planet portraits were taken in visible light with Hubble's new Wide Field Camera 3.
Credits
NASA, ESA, M.H. Wong (University of California, Berkeley), A.A. Simon-Miller (Goddard Space Flight Center), H.B. Hammel (Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.), and the Jupiter Impact Science Team| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Jupiter |
| Object Description | Planet |
| Distance | The semi-major axis of Jupiter's orbit about the Sun is 5.2 astronomical units (483 million miles or 778 million km). On June 7, 2010 Jupiter was 475 million miles from Earth. |
| Dimensions | The planet has a diameter of roughly 88,789 miles (142,984 km) at the equator. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The image was created from Hubble data from proposal : A. Simon-Miller (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center), H. Hammel (Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.), I. de Pater (University of California, Berkeley), L. Fletcher (University of Oxford), G. Orton (Jet Propulsion Laboratory), M. Wong (University of California, Berkley), A. Sanchez-Lavega (University of the Basque Country, Spain), J. Clarke (Boston University), and K. Noll (STScI). Note: The comparison data from HST WFC3 observations taken in 2009 are from proposals and : H. Hammel (Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.), A. Simon-Miller (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center), J. Clarke (Boston University), I. de Pater (University of California, Berkeley), K. Noll (STScI), G. Orton (Jet Propulsion Laboratory), A. Sanchez-Lavega (University of the Basque Country, Spain), and M. Wong (University of California, Berkley). |
| Instrument | HST>WFC3/UVIS |
| Exposure Dates | July 23, 2009 and June 7, 2010 |
| Filters | F395N (395 nm), F502N (502 nm), and F631N (631 nm) |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | The image is a composite of separate exposures made by the WFC3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Three filters were used to sample narrow wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic image. In this case, the assigned colors are: Blue: F395N (395 nm) Green: F502N (502 nm) Red: F631N (631 nm) |
| Compass Image |  |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
