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One planet in our solar system dwarfs all the rest. Jupiter. Made almost entirely of hydrogen and helium, Jupiter's mass is 1,300 times greater than Earth. When it comes to the planets in our solar system, really the story is all about Jupiter. Add up all the masses, 70% is in that one planet alone. Jupiter isn't just big. It is also extreme. Jupiter has a magnetic field so powerful that it tears away charged particles from its moons to make super-sized aurorae at the poles. The temperature at the center of the planet is 41,000° F. That's hotter than the surface of the sun. Astronomers have studied Jupiter for centuries, but its biggest mysteries still confound them.
Why is Jupiter so extreme? What are the hidden processes that drive the planet's ferocity? Three, two, one. Ignition and liftoff of the Atlas V with Juno on a trek to Jupiter. In 2011, NASA launches mission Juno to unlock these mysteries. The Juno probe carries a suite of super-advanced instruments. A particle detector, infrared and ultraviolet imaging, and a magnetometer to peer deeper into Jupiter than ever before. You can only learn so much about a planet by looking at it through a telescope. Sometimes you just have to go there. And so, Juno is a payload of some of the most advanced instrumentation that we've ever sent into the void of
space, and it took this epic journey to Jupiter, this incredibly distant planet. Juno arrives at Jupiter in 2016. The probe's onboard camera beams back to Earth spectacular images of the surface of this mega planet. Juno gets so close and sees it in such detail that I've seen images of this planet that I didn't even recognize as being Jupiter. The color palette of Jupiter is beyond belief. All of these oranges and reds and deep browns and yellows. I have to sometimes remind myself that I'm looking at a planet because it's just so beautiful. I've never seen astronomical images like these before.
These swirling bands look tranquil from orbit. But it's a different story up close. These bands are actually giant storms. They're jet streams many times faster than the jet streams on Earth. And not only that, they're going in different directions. One cloud band going against the other one. The turbulence that's created is absolutely spectacular. The wind speeds inside these bands reach 370 mph. Winds this strong twist the gas into super cyclones. The largest of Jupiter's storms is the famous Great Red Spot. But a riddle remains for Juno to solve.
What powers the planet's mega winds and super storms? Astronomers believe that measuring the depth of the storm bands on Jupiter could reveal the source of the mysterious energy that drives them. The sun powers the weather here on Earth. It's radiation penetrates the Earth's atmosphere and heats the surface of our planet. It is this heat that drives the range of weather we experience. Traditional telescopes cannot see through the colorful swirling bands wrapped around Jupiter. So, astronomers cannot tell exactly what source of energy drives Jupiter's extreme weather.
Juno uses Jupiter's own gravity to measure exactly how far the storm bands reach into the gas giant. The density of the storm bands affects Jupiter's gravity. This gravity changes Juno's velocity as it passes over the planet. Denser areas with stronger gravity pull the probe inwards. Areas of weaker gravity release it outwards. By plotting the shifts in Juno's orbit, scientists build up a super accurate density map of Jupiter. Scientists can gauge the true size of storms raging through the planet's atmosphere by measuring Juno's speed. As Juno moves around Jupiter, we can
measure tiny changes in its velocity. And those depend on changes of the mass of the planet underneath it. So, by measuring the speed of Juno as it travels, we're actually seeing the different masses of the different storm bands on Jupiter. The more massive a storm band is, the deeper it extends into Jupiter. The measurements that Juno takes reveal that these bands reach 1,800 mi into the planet. What Juno is showing us is that these things go very, very deep, surprisingly deep. The huge depth of the storm bands is an important clue in solving the mystery of what drives the extreme weather on Jupiter.
Here on Earth, the weather is controlled by energy from the Sun. That's what powers it. Jupiter is five times farther away from the Sun than the Earth is, and its atmosphere is super thick. So, it can't be energy from the Sun that's powering all these storms. What is the mysterious source of energy that powers Jupiter's megastorms? And how does this gas giant produce the largest magnetic field of any planet in the solar system? Jupiter is the biggest and most extreme world in our solar system. NASA's Juno probe reveals that Jupiter's megastorms stretch 1,800 mi into the planet. But, the Sun is too far away for its energy to power winds this deep.
The immense energy that has to be powering these incredible storms can't be coming from outside Jupiter. It has to be coming from within it. So, what could that energy source be? Researchers in Marseille, France, run innovative laboratory experiments to find out. This tank holds 130 gallons of water and tens of thousands of fluorescent plastic beads. These beads represent the gas in Jupiter's thick atmosphere. The researchers spin the tank to mimic Jupiter's rotation. Powerful pumps at the bottom of the tank blast the water.
This simulates energy that radiates from inside Jupiter. A camera tracks the precise movement of the beads. The beads arrange into alternately spinning bands. And these bands are very deep. Just like the real storm bands on Jupiter. The researchers believe these results show that a huge concentration of heat energy inside Jupiter could be what is driving the planet's extreme weather. Astronomers think that the way Jupiter formed 4 and 1/2 billion years ago unlocks why the planet is so hot.
