Why does jupiter have stripes

However, until now, scientists were uncertain how deep those bands reached into Jupiter. NASA's Juno spacecraft , in orbit around Jupiter, "is now providing a 3D picture of these streams of Jupiter, and they go far deeper than ever expected," Kaspi told Space. Juno orbits Jupiter every 53 days.

As the planet's gravitational field tugs on Juno, the radio signals that the probe sends back to Earth shift a bit. The greater the mass under Juno, the stronger the gravitational pull the spacecraft and its radio waves experience.

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By Erika K. Carlson Published: Wednesday, August 15, What would Jupiter be without its stripes? Darker regions where air falls are called belts.

When these opposing flows interact, storms and turbulence appear. Zones have darkened into belts and belts have lightened and transformed into zones. Cloud features have rapidly altered in shape and size. Click image to enlarge The image at left shows a thin band of white clouds above Jupiter's equator.

The white color indicates clouds at higher altitudes in Jupiter's atmosphere. One day on Jupiter takes only about 10 hours the time it takes for Jupiter to rotate or spin around once , and Jupiter makes a complete orbit around the Sun a year in Jovian time in about 12 Earth years 4, Earth days. Its equator is tilted with respect to its orbital path around the Sun by just 3 degrees. This means Jupiter spins nearly upright and does not have seasons as extreme as other planets do. With four large moons and many smaller moons, Jupiter forms a kind of miniature solar system.

Jupiter has 53 confirmed moons and 26 provisional moons awaiting confirmation of discovery. Moons are named after they are confirmed. Jupiter's four largest moons — Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto — were first observed by the astronomer Galileo Galilei in using an early version of the telescope. These four moons are known today as the Galilean satellites, and they're some of the most fascinating destinations in our solar system.

Io is the most volcanically active body in the solar system. Ganymede is the largest moon in the solar system even bigger than the planet Mercury. A liquid-water ocean with the ingredients for life may lie beneath the frozen crust of Europa, making it a tempting place to explore. Discovered in by NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft, Jupiter's rings were a surprise, as they are composed of small, dark particles and are difficult to see except when backlit by the Sun.

Data from the Galileo spacecraft indicate that Jupiter's ring system may be formed by dust kicked up as interplanetary meteoroids smash into the giant planet's small innermost moons.

Jupiter took shape when the rest of the solar system formed about 4. Jupiter took most of the mass left over after the formation of the Sun, ending up with more than twice the combined material of the other bodies in the solar system.

In fact, Jupiter has the same ingredients as a star, but it did not grow massive enough to ignite. About 4 billion years ago, Jupiter settled into its current position in the outer solar system, where it is the fifth planet from the Sun. The composition of Jupiter is similar to that of the Sun — mostly hydrogen and helium.

Deep in the atmosphere, pressure and temperature increase, compressing the hydrogen gas into a liquid. This gives Jupiter the largest ocean in the solar system — an ocean made of hydrogen instead of water. Scientists think that, at depths perhaps halfway to the planet's center, the pressure becomes so great that electrons are squeezed off the hydrogen atoms, making the liquid electrically conducting like metal.

Jupiter's fast rotation is thought to drive electrical currents in this region, generating the planet's powerful magnetic field. It is still unclear if deeper down, Jupiter has a central core of solid material or if it may be a thick, super-hot and dense soup.