Traveling above Jupiter at more
than 130,000 miles per hour, NASA's $1 billion Juno probe took its ninth set of
stunning flyby images on October 24. But the sun slipped between the giant
planet and Earth for more than a week, blocking the spacecraft from beaming
home its precious bounty of data.
Now that the conjunction is
over, however, new raw image data from Juno's ninth perijove — as the
spacecraft's high-speed flybys are called — has poured in. Researchers posted
it all online on Tuesday, and a community of amateurs and professionals has been
busily processing the data to yield colorful and stunning new pictures of
Jupiter.
Below are some fresh, close-up
images of Jupiter, along with other unbelievable views captured from earlier
perijoves.
In the most recent flyby, as
with the previous eight, Juno's flyby started over Jupiter's north pole.
The spacecraft then swept within a few thousand miles of the gas
giant, capturing stunning high-resolution views of its cloud tops.
At its closest approach to
Jupiter during each flyby, the robot briefly becomes the fastest human-made
object in the solar system, reaching speeds of around 130,000 miles per hour.
Then Juno flew back out into deep space, passing over Jupiter's South Pole on its exit. Churning storms at the poles constantly change their appearance.
Researchers upload the raw data sent by the probe to the mission's website.
Many snapshots of Jupiter take on an artistic quality.
Some of the tempests are large enough to swallow planet Earth — or at least a good chunk of it
Other times, shining-white clouds fill up most
of a band. With an average temperature of minus 234 degrees Fahrenheit (minus
145 degrees Celsius), Jupiter is frigid even in its warmest weather. Unlike
Earth, whose temperature varies as one moves closer to or farther from the
equator, Jupiter's temperature depends more on height above the surface
In this older view of Jupiter, from Juno's
eighth perijove, two cloud bands battle for dominance — one of which contains a
swirling storm many times larger than a hurricane on Earth
The spacecraft will continue to document
Jupiter for as long as NASA can keep it going. But not forever.
Updated Version.
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