10 AMAZING Jupiter Facts That SCARED Scientists
Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system, and it’s also one of the most unique.
In this video, we’ll be going through some of the most AMAZING Jupiter Facts That SCARED Scientists:
10. Its size
As we’ve already mentioned, Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system.
To us humans who have lived here on Earth all our lives, the sheer size of Jupiter would be
almost incomprehensible. The Earth is barely a dot when compared to Jupiter. Jupiter is about 139,820
km in diameter, in comparison, the earth is only 12,742 km in diameter.
Due to its sheer size, Jupiter is sometimes referred to as a failed star,
as it barely missed the definition of being a star itself. While Jupiter is by far the largest planet
in terms of size, the difference is even bigger when you consider its mass. Jupiter’s mass is
about 2.5 more massive than every single planet in our solar system combined. It’s 318 times
more massive than the earth alone, despite being only 11 times larger than the earth in diameter.
9. Jupiter has an ocean
What makes Jupiter so different from the earth and even Mars is that the planet doesn’t really have
solid land you can walk on. Instead, Jupiter is known as a “gas planet” or a “gas giant”,
it doesn’t have a solid surface but rather is composed of various different gasses and liquids.
But one similarity that Jupiter might just have with the earth is its massive ocean. Jupiter,
much like the sun, is mainly made up of hydrogen and helium, however, once these gasses are
pressurized further into Jupiter’s atmosphere and the temperature increases, these gasses turn
into liquids. This has, in turn. Given Jupiter the single largest ocean in our solar system.
The main difference is that unlike Earth’s ocean, which is made up of h2o,
Jupiter’s ocean is made up of hydrogen alone.
8. The Great Red Spot
At this point, we all know what Jupiter looks like, and its image is probably etched into our
brains forever, but have you ever wondered what that massive red spot on Jupiter is?
Well, it’s literally called “The Great Red Spot '', and despite being just a
small part of Jupiter itself, it’s actually way bigger than you’d even think to imagine.
The Great Big Red Spot is actually a continuous storm that has been happening for hundreds of
years, the storm is so big that it would be able to encircle the entire earth multiple times over.
The storm is constantly moving counterclockwise and it takes over six (earth) days to complete
one rotation. While we know all this about the Great Red Spot, we don’t actually know
what gives it a red color as we’ve never been able to closely examine what makes up the storm.
7. The speed of Jupiter
Jupiter is not just big, it’s also really fast. While measuring speed in space can be a bit of
a complicated procedure, and measuring time in space is even more complicated, we’re going to
be sticking to Earth hours and days for this one. Jupiter is considered to be the fastest
object in our solar system, it’s constantly spinning at the speed of 45,300 km an hour,
in comparison, the earth is constantly spinning at the speed of 1600 km an hour. This means that
despite Jupiter’s massive size, a day on Jupiter is actually much shorter than a day on Earth.
It takes just a little less than 10 earth hours for Jupiter to complete a full day,
almost a full hour faster than the second fastest planet, Saturn.
6. Jupiter Has Rings
Speaking of Saturn, that planet is mostly known for being one of the most unique planets in our
solar system, and that’s mostly due to its iconic ring. However, Saturn is not the only planet with
a ring. In fact, all four gas giants in our solar system, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus, and Jupiter,
all have rings. Jupiter’s ring is much smaller and easier to miss than that of any other planet,
and most images of Jupiter tend to focus on the planet itself and not its ring.
Jupiter has 3 different unique ring systems, each larger than the other, there is the Halo ring,
the Main Ring, and the recently discovered outer gossamer ring. In more recent times,
Jupiter is now depicted with a ring or multiple ones, but they’re usually not very prominent.
5. Jupiter’s History
It’s quite difficult to get a clear history of a planet so far away from our own that was formed
such a long time ago, but still, we have a pretty good understanding of Jupiter’s history as a
planet. Jupiter formed about 4.5 billion years ago while the rest of the solar system was also being
formed. It was formed as a result of large chunks of dust and gas gathering up in one location,
eventually growing large enough to form a planet itself.
It didn’t take long for humans to discover Jupiter, considering it
is the third brightest object we can actually see from the earth, after the sun and the moon.
It’s not clear when exactly humans came to know of Jupiter, as much ancient art seems to suggest
we’ve always known of Jupiter. But the first ever detailed look into Jupiter came when, in 1610,
Galileo Galilei extensively studied this planet with his state-of-the-art (at the time) telescope.
4. Jupiter cleans up our solar system
Jupiter’s large size is actually a huge advantage to us here on Earth. Jupiter is sometimes called
the “vacuum cleaner of the solar system”, and this is because Jupiter’s intense gravitational pull
and magnetic field causes any incoming asteroid or comet to either slow down or go off its course
when it’s headed towards the earth. It’s entirely possible that if it weren’t for Jupiter, the earth
might have seen many other mass extinction events that were rooted in space, and it doesn’t just
protect the earth, but pretty much every planet on the solar system beyond it. Some scientists
question exactly how much Jupiter’s gravitational pull actually protects the earth specifically,
and but there is an almost unanimous consensus that it makes the earth significantly safer.
3. Jupiter’s Temperature
Jupiter is, unsurprisingly, really cold. The average temperature on Jupiter is around minus
234 degrees Fahrenheit for most of the year, but the temperature on this planet can vary a
lot depending on how far away from the surface of the planet you are. This means as you get
further into Jupiter, it’s going to get hotter and hotter, when you get to the core of Jupiter, which
isn’t as difficult as getting to the core of the earth because the surface of Jupiter isn’t solid,
the temperature there would each a level even hotter than the sun itself. This is much different
from how temperature works on earth where it varies based on the distance from the equator.
2. Auroras on Jupiter
Auroras are some of the most strikingly beautiful features of the earth,
and many of us tend to associate auroras with the earth only. But that’s not true, auroras
are caused when solar winds are pulled into the earth’s atmosphere because of its magnetic field,
and when they collide with the atmosphere, the auroras are formed.
Jupiter’s magnetic field is a million times stronger than the Earth’s magnetic field,
and a similar phenomenon happens on Jupiter’s poles. In fact, the auroras that happen on Jupiter
are actually much larger and much brighter than the earth itself, NASA has been taking
multiple pictures every day in order to show how this aurora moves around Jupiter’s pole.
1. Jupiter’s moons
One of the most incredible things about Jupiter isn’t even on the planet itself,
but rather the natural satellites that surround this planet. Yes, Jupiter has a lot of moons. 79
to be exact with more to potentially be found. The vast majority of Jupiter’s moons are tiny,
less than 10 kilometers in diameter. There are, however, a few moons that are huge.
Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon, is also the largest moon in our entire solar system. This moon
is even bigger than Mercury, an entire planet! Ganymede is at least lucky enough to have its own
name, something many of Jupiter’s moons aren’t blessed with. Out of the 79 Jupiter moons that
we know of thus far, 26 of them don’t even have names, most of them were found by accident without
actually looking for them. The most important ones are all named though, and the four most important
ones are collectively known as the Galilean moons, these are Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
What’s even more interesting is that many of Jupiter’s moons have even shown signs of potential
life and habitability, and they may be a high priority for a visit by NASA in the near future.
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