Tag Archive for 'Gas giant'

Jupiter is revisited by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope in these images, taken on January 5-6, 2024, capturing both sides of the giant planet. Image credit: NASA / ESA / STScI / Amy Simon, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Hubble Space Telescope Captures Beautiful New Images of Jupiter

Mar 14, 2024 by News Staff

The many large storms and small white clouds seen in the new Hubble images, taken on January 5 and 6, 2024, are evidence for a lot of activity going on...

The JunoCam instrument aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft imaged Io, the most geologically active body in our Solar System, on February 3, 2024, from a distance of about 7,904 km (4,911 miles). Image credit: NASA / SwRI / MSSS.

NASA’s Juno Orbiter Captures Stunning Images of Jupiter’s Moon Io

Feb 9, 2024 by Natali Anderson

On February 3, 2024, NASA’s Juno spacecraft made a second close flyby of Io, the fifth of Jupiter’s moons and the third largest. Like the previous...

Mimas’ surface, like the surfaces of most of the other major Saturnian moons without atmospheres, is not pure ice but contains some dark impurities; the relatively dark markings appear along the lower portion of the walls of the 130-km-wide Herschel Crater (the peak in the middle of the crater is about as tall as Mount Everest; the impact that made it likely almost destroyed the moon) and some of the smaller craters; scientists interpret this darkening as evidence for the gradual concentration of impurities from evaporating icy materials in areas where the dark impurities slide slowly down the crater wall. Image credit: NASA / JPL / Space Science Institute.

Saturn’s Moon Mimas Harbors Global Ocean beneath Its Icy Shell, Study Suggests

Feb 7, 2024 by News Staff

From detailed analysis of Mimas’ orbital motion based on data from NASA’s Cassini mission, planetary researchers from Sorbonne Université, Nantes...

This artist’s illustration shows WASP-121b, an alien world that is losing magnesium and iron gas from its atmosphere. Image credit: NASA / ESA / J. Olmsted, STScI.

Hubble Detects Massive Cyclones in Atmosphere of WASP-121b

Jan 10, 2024 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have detected massive cyclones and other dynamic weather activity swirling on WASP-121b, an ultrahot-Jupiter...

This Hubble image shows Saturn, its bright white rings, and its three moons: Mimas, Dione, and Enceladus; spoke features on the left and right sides of the rings appear like faint gray smudges against the rings’ bright backdrop, about midway from the planet to the rings’ outer edge. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / STScI / Amy Simon, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Hubble Space Telescope Spots ‘Spokes’ in Saturn’s Rings

Dec 21, 2023 by News Staff

The gas giant Saturn is known for its iconic ring system. However, its B ring can have splotches and streaks of darker or lighter material, known as spokes,...

An artist’s impression of the giant exoplanet Kepler-1704b. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Neptune-Mass Exoplanet around Ultracool Dwarf Star Challenges Current Theories of Planet Formation

Nov 30, 2023 by Natali Anderson

Current theories predict that low-mass stars should rarely host planets with masses exceeding that of Neptune (17 Earth masses). An artist’s impression...

The six planets in the HD 110067 system are all smaller than Neptune and revolve around their parent star in a very precise waltz: when the closest planet to the star makes three full revolutions around it, the second one makes exactly two during the same time; this is called a 3:2 resonance; the six planets form a resonant chain in pairs of 3:2, 3:2, 3:2, 4:3, and 4:3, resulting in the closest planet completing six orbits while the outer-most planet does one. Image credit: ESA / CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.

Astronomers Discover Resonant System of Six Sub-Neptune Exoplanets around HD 110067

Nov 30, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

The bright nearby star HD 110067 hosts six transiting sub-Neptunes that follow a chain of resonant orbits, according to new research led by University...

This illustration depicts findings that Jupiter’s atmospheric winds penetrate the planet in a cylindrical manner and parallel to its spin axis. The most dominant jet recorded by NASA’s Juno is shown in the cutout: the jet is at 21 degrees north latitude at cloud level, but 3,000 km below that, it’s at 13 degrees north latitude. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SSI / SWRI / MSSS / ASI / INAF / JIRAM / Björn Jónsson / CC BY 3.0.

Atmospheric Winds Penetrate Jupiter in Cylindrical Manner, Planetary Researchers Say

Nov 9, 2023 by News Staff

The violent nature of Jupiter’s atmosphere has long been a source of fascination for scientists. NASA’s Juno spacecraft has had a ringside seat to...

This Hubble image shows Jupiter in ultraviolet light. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / M. Wong, University of California, Berkeley / Gladys Kober, NASA & Catholic University of America.

Hubble Space Telescope Captures Ultraviolet Image of Jupiter

Nov 2, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

NASA has released a beautiful ultraviolet image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope of the gas giant Jupiter. This Hubble image shows Jupiter in ultraviolet...

Illustration depicting one interpretation of the exoplanet GJ 357d. Image credit: Chris Smith / NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Giant Exoplanets Are Potential ‘Agents of Chaos’ in Multiplanet Systems, Astronomers Say

Oct 31, 2023 by News Staff

Two new papers in the Astronomical Journal show that in some multiplanet systems, giant planets tend to kick their smaller neighbors out of orbit and wreak...

This Webb image of Jupiter shows stunning details of the majestic planet in infrared light. In this image, brightness indicates high altitude. The numerous bright white ‘spots’ and ‘streaks’ are likely very high-altitude cloud tops of condensed convective storms. Aurorae, appearing in red in this image, extend to higher altitudes above both the northern and southern poles of the planet. By contrast, dark ribbons north of the equatorial region have little cloud cover. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / Ricardo Hueso, UPV / Imke de Pater, UC Berkeley / Thierry Fouchet, Observatory of Paris / Leigh Fletcher, University of Leicester / Michael H. Wong, UC Berkeley / Joseph DePasquale, STScI.

Webb Spots High-Speed Equatorial Jet in Jupiter’s Stratosphere

Oct 19, 2023 by News Staff

The newly-discovered intense (140 m/s) jet is confined to ±3° of Jupiter’s equator, is approximately 4,800 km wide, and is located in the gas giant’s...

Jupiter-Like Exoplanets May Be More Common than Previously Found

Oct 18, 2023 by News Staff

Young moving stellar groups are the best targets for direct imaging of exoplanets and four massive Jupiter-like planets have been already discovered in...

Hubble observed Saturn on June 20, 2019 as the planet made its closest approach to Earth this year, at approximately 808 million miles away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / A. Simon, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / M.H. Wong, University of California, Berkeley / OPAL Team.

Saturn’s Rings May Have Formed Following Massive Collision between Two Moons, Scientists Say

Oct 3, 2023 by News Staff

Saturn’s rings could have evolved from the debris of two progenitor icy moons that collided and shattered a few hundred million years ago; debris that...

An artist’s rendition of the two exoplanets and their parent star in the TOI-4600 system. Image credit: Tedi Vick.

Two Long-Period Giant Exoplanets Found Orbiting TOI-4600

Aug 31, 2023 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers report the discovery and validation of two long-period giant exoplanets orbiting the K-dwarf star TOI-4600, first detected using observations...

An artist’s impression of a hot-Jupiter exoplanet. Image credit: ESA / ATG Medialab / CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.

Astronomers Confirm Detection of Chromium Hydride in Atmosphere of WASP-31b

Aug 28, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

Chromium hydride is often used to probe atmospheric temperatures and classify objects called brown dwarfs into spectral types because it’s abundant only...

For most of the time, Saturn’s atmosphere looks hazy and featureless to the naked eye in contrast to Jupiter’s colorful and vibrant atmosphere. This picture changes when we look at Saturn using a radio eye. Despite bland looking at the visible wavelengths, different latitudes on Saturn show dramatic contrast in the radio emission. In 2015, Li et al. found substantial brightness temperature variations -- greater than the temperature increase caused by the 2010 storm -- as a function of latitude and radio wavelength based on spatially resolved radio images of Saturn, as obtained from the VLA. Via a spectral inversion study, they created a latitude-altitude map of ammonia concentration anomalies from these images and correlate the anomalies to the occurrences of past giant storms in the northern hemisphere. Image credit: S. Dagnello / NRAO / AUI / NSF / Li et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adg9419.

VLA Reveals Megastorm-Centric Disruptions in Saturnian Atmosphere

Aug 14, 2023 by News Staff

Planetary-scale giant storms erupt on Saturn periodically. There have been at least six recorded occurrences of past eruptions, and the most recent one...

An artist’s impression of a gas-giant exoplanet. Image credit: Sci.News.

Astronomers Discover Jupiter-Sized Exoplanet around Low-Mass Star

Aug 4, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

Using data from TRAPPIST-South/North, SPECULOOS, and MuSCAT3 facilities, astronomers have discovered an unusual Jupiter-sized exoplanet orbiting the red...

This ALMA image shows the young planetary system PDS 70. The system features a star at its center, around which the planet PDS 70b (highlighted with a solid yellow circle) is orbiting. On the same orbit as PDS 70b, indicated by a solid yellow ellipse, Balsalobre-Ruza et al. detected a cloud of debris (circled by a yellow dotted line) that could be the building blocks of a new planet or the remnants of one already formed. The ring-like structure that dominates the image is a circumstellar disk of material, out of which planets are forming. There is in fact another planet in this system: PDS 70c, seen at 3 o’clock right next to the inner rim of the disk. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / Balsalobre-Ruza et al.

ALMA Detects Possible Trojan Protoplanet around PDS 70

Jul 20, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

PDS 70, a young K7-type star some 370 light-years away from Earth in the constellation of Centaurus, is a unique target for planetary formation studies...

An artist’s impression of LTT 9779b orbiting its host star. Image credit: Ricardo Ramírez Reyes, Universidad de Chile.

Cheops Finds Metal Clouds in Atmosphere of Ultrahot Neptune

Jul 10, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

Aside from the Moon, the brightest object in our night sky is planet Venus, whose thick cloud layer reflects around 75% of the Sun’s light. By comparison,...

The direct image of the giant exoplanet AF Lep b. Image credit: Franson et al., doi: 10.3847/2041-8213/acd6f6.

Astronomers Directly Image Jupiter-Like Exoplanet around Nearby Young Star

Jul 4, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

The giant exoplanet AF Leporis b orbits a 1.2-solar-mass star in the 24-million-year-old beta Pictoris moving group. The direct image of the giant exoplanet...

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