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Mystery Spot on Jupiter Baffles Astronomers

Posted by Hemos on from the the-black-big-red-spot dept.

seanmeister writes "From Space.com: "Astronomers have spotted a strange, obvious and inexplicable black spot near the equator of Jupiter. A picture of the object is circling this planet electronically as researchers scratch their heads about what they've found. A second image, taken on another day by a different photographer, contains a similar looking spot. As of early today, the second image had deepened the mystery. Some astronomers were at first puzzled over whether the two photos show the same thing or not. As it turns out, they do not." I, for one, welcome our new monolith overlords!"

5 of 64 comments (clear)

  1. Thanks by avalys · · Score: 5, Informative

    The link to the actual article.

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  2. Maybe not so mysterious... by OneOver137 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I was googling for info and came across a page from JPL. The date is 1998 and the photo from Galileo.

    An excerpt:

    "A recently discovered black spot in Jupiter's clouds is darker than any featue ever before observed on the giant planet. The spot may be theresult of a downward spiraling wind that blows away high clouds and revealsdeeper, very dark cloud layers." Here's the link:

    http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01496

  3. Is it just me by barakn · · Score: 3, Informative

    or did anybody else notice that Jupiter's north pole is pointing down in these photos. Oh, yeah, and look at this page for some photos of dark spots caused by comet Shoemaker-Levi 9.

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    "I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
    1. Re:Is it just me by barakn · · Score: 2, Informative
      Something that is upside-down AND left-right reversed has merely been rotated 180 deg (its 'handedness' changes every time you flip it, whether it's right-left or upside-down, and two flips will rectify it). If you rotate the aforementioned Jupiter photos, the red spot appears in the appropriate southern hemisphere and the surface features rotate in the right direction.

      In fact, anybody who images Jupiter through a telescope isn't likely to catch it with its equator nicely aligned with with the CCD's pixel matrix, so somebody had to rotate Jupiter's image just to get its axis to appear straight up & down. I'm curious as to why they choose the north-down perspective, but it's not to be mean. 'Cause I'm left-handed. That's the hand I use, well, never mind......

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      "I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
  4. Re:Mystery spot? by ivanmarsh · · Score: 3, Informative

    and water and golf balls run up hill.

    http://www.mysteryspot.com/

    Right outside my home town.