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NASA Spacecraft Reveals Jupiter's Interior In Unprecedented Detail (theguardian.com)
NASA's Juno spacecraft has revealed that Jupiter's iconic striped bands, caused by immensely powerful winds, extend to a depth of about 3,000km below the surface. The findings also provide a partial answer to the question of whether the planet has a core, "showing that the inner 96% of the planet rotates 'as a solid body,' even though technically it is composed of an extraordinarily dense mixture of hydrogen and helium gas," reports The Guardian. From the report: The findings are published in four separate papers in the journal Nature, describing the planet's gravitational field (surprisingly asymmetrical), atmospheric flows, interior composition and polar cyclones. A crucial question was whether the bands on Jupiter, caused by air currents that are five times as strong as the most powerful hurricanes on Earth, were a "weather" phenomenon comparable to the Earth's jet streams or part of a deep-seated convection system. Juno's latest observations point to the latter, showing the jets continued to around 3,000km beneath the surface -- deep enough to cause ripples and asymmetries in the planet's gravitational field that were perceptible to detectors on the spacecraft. On Earth, the atmosphere represents about a millionth of the mass of the whole planet. The latest work suggests that on Jupiter the figure is closer to 1%. The new findings, based on extremely sensitive gravitational measurements, also begin to paint a picture of the internal structure of the planet.
These articles are among the best on Slashdot. With me not following Astronomy-related news closely, but having an interest in Astronomy, they're always very welcome and nice surprises.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
Fuck you racist. Im going to dox you. And them im going to ban all of your ips, get your real name, and make sure you never post here again. I will END you racist! This isnt funny! I WILL FIND A WAY TO STOP YOU!
They will be deleting your and your crap! We will not tolerate your kind here!
Any links to non-Paywalled articles, because why let Georg von Holtzbrinck's spawn profiteer on work done by NASA?
JunoCAM, which is a seriously downgraded camera system (there is barely a zoom on the lens), almost wasn't even included on this mission since NASA felt visual observations were unnecessary and wouldn't provide anything useful scientifically. Just imagine we could have had even better visuals than this if a larger more sophisticated camera was included. Oh well.
I was hoping to see inside Uranus.
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OKAY! It's been posted. Sorry folks, you're too late to make the joke now.
Slashdot should start IP banning and maybe even shadow banning for off-topic AC troll posts. It would make the discussions a better place.
You could see that daily on Slashdot a couple of decades ago.
I was hoping to see inside Uranus. . . . . . . OKAY! It's been posted. Sorry folks, you're too late to make the joke now.
I don't know why you think that is a joke. It's called the Advanced NASA Atmospheric Lithographic Lidar Probe and it was designed to update us about the aerosols in Uranus.
Last I heard they were figuring out just how many instruments they can include to explore Uranus and the rings around it. First the rings and then and deep as they can go for as long as there is battery power remaining to keep all of the instruments going before it is crushed by the pressure of the most concentrated source of methane in the solar system. That's right, there is a lot of methane in Uranus.
If you're laughing now, you can just stop it - you're being juvenile. Exploring Uranus is a serious undertaking that many people are committed to and clever jokes about "hoping to see inside Uranus" are just unsophisticated. We're better than that here.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Bitch, please.
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
I was hoping to see inside Uranus.
.
.
.
.
.
.
OKAY! It's been posted. Sorry folks, you're too late to make the joke now.
I don't know why you think that is a joke. It's called the
Advanced NASA Atmospheric Lithographic Lidar Probe and it was designed to update us about the aerosols in Uranus.
Last I heard they were figuring out just how many instruments they can include to explore Uranus and the rings around it. First the rings and then and deep as they can go for as long as there is battery power remaining to keep all of the instruments going before it is crushed by the pressure of the most concentrated source of methane in the solar system. That's right, there is a lot of methane in Uranus.
If you're laughing now, you can just stop it - you're being juvenile. Exploring Uranus is a serious undertaking that many people are committed to and clever jokes about "hoping to see inside Uranus" are just unsophisticated. We're better than that here.
Would those be non-inert hydrocarbon aerosols?
I got a note from ars technica that I was banned for spamming. WTF? Contacted Ars and told them I have an account from a few years ago but haven't posted in years. They quickly got back to me, I googled my IP address and sent it to them, my IP address was quickly whitelisted. Yea Ars!
As always, the scale of things in space is always nuts, especially when talking about the Sun and Jupiter.
These winds extend nearly 3,000kms into the planet, for comparison, Earth's diameter is roughly 12,700km and Mars is ~6,000km. So the winds extend roughly a 1/4 of the Earth and basically half of mars.
I was hoping to see inside Uranus
Well, if Uranus internals looks like Jupiters find a physician near you.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
For general information, the surface is said (by consensus) to be the depth at which the atmospheric pressure is the same as that at sea level on Earth. There is no adjustment for gravity nor temperature. That is, it is pressure and not density. I mention this since it isn't obvious what "surface" means when applied to gas giants (or stars, for that matter - although stars have a completely different (and incompatible) definition for their "surface".)
What does Uranus have that Jupiter hasn't? A fucking trident? Jupiter can shoot death rays out of his anus.
Lets hope basic planetary science doesn't end up in the budgetary chopping block for the stunt missions aiming to boost "national pride." In any country.
>> On Earth, the atmosphere represents about a millionth of the mass of the whole planet. The latest work suggests that on Jupiter the figure is closer to 1%.
However, the article also says, "the inner 96% of the planet rotates as a solid body, even though technically it is composed of an extraordinarily dense mixture of hydrogen and helium gas"
So...is that 1% really 4%?
Jupiter is an almost red dwarf star.
Study of it tells us a lot about small stars.
Of course scientists got tired of all of these jokes and renamed Uranus in 2620 to Urectum.
If you read the attached article at The Guardian, you might note that Nasa could extend this mission, it's a question of budgeting. This is the first I heard that the spacecraft could continue operating past this point. It will cost billions for the next mission to the outer planets, 3 or 4 billion a year on the pointless job creator/SLS mission, shouldn't we extend this mission if we can?
We're better than that here.
Have you met us?
Nope, no sig
APK and GNAA troll posts are the only things that keep me coming back to Slashdot.
So when the probe runs out of life are they going to crash it into Uranus like they did on Saturn? So they can see what is down there?
This... is what I miss about the just post Chips&Dips, Slash Dot, sublime humor.
We're better than that here.
Have you met us?
Yes I have and I don't understand why probing Uranus with battery power instruments has been moderated funny.
WE NEED TO TAKE URANUS MORE SERIOUSLY PEOPLE!!
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
In a world where there was ever any significant public debate on planetary missions, that would be a sensible claim. We don't live in such a world. The general public doesn't give a rats ass about space. They're not going to call their congresscritters and go "I didn't get any pretty pictures from Juno, cancel the Europa lander!". The vast majority of them probably don't even know Juno exists in the first place.
You should just accept that you're into dick. Nobody who isn't would bother with all this shit. Sad bastard.