Surprise -- Jupiter Has A New Red Spot


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Backyard astronomers, grab your telescopes. Jupiter is growing a new red spot.

The official name of the new storm is "Oval BA," but "Red Jr." might be better. It's about half the size of the famous Great Red Spot and almost exactly the same color.

Oval BA first appeared in the year 2000 when three smaller spots collided and merged. Using Hubble and other telescopes, astronomers watched with great interest. A similar merger that happened centuries ago may have created the original Great Red Spot, a storm twice as wide as our planet and at least 300 years old.

Oval BA has been changing colors in recent months. It was white in November 2005, slowly turned brown in December and then red a few weeks ago.

Curiously, no one knows precisely why the Great Red Spot itself is red. A favorite idea is that the storm dredges material from deep beneath Jupiter's cloudtops and lifts it to high altitudes where solar ultraviolet radiation--via some unknown chemical reaction?produces the familiar brick color.

"The Great Red Spot is the most powerful storm on Jupiter, indeed, in the whole solar system," said Glenn Orton, an astronomer at JPL who specializes in studies of storms on Jupiter and other giant planets.

?The top of the storm rises 8 km above surrounding clouds. It takes a powerful storm to lift material so high,? Orton said.

Oval BA may have strengthened enough to do the same. Like the Great Red Spot, Red Jr. may be lifting material above the clouds where solar ultraviolet rays turn "chromophores" (color-changing compounds) red. If so, the deepening red is a sign that the storm is intensifying.

"Some of Jupiter's white ovals have appeared slightly reddish before, for example in late 1999, but not often and not for long," says John Rogers, author of the book "Jupiter: The Giant Planet," which recounts telescopic observations of Jupiter over the last 100 years.

"It will indeed be interesting to see if Oval BA becomes permanently red," Rogers said.

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:unsure: I wonder what makes the spot reddish -- Is this copper, iron-oxide particles ? Or a 'red-shift' effect as the vortex pulls in the energy ?

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Erm... I dunno... I'm not a Jupiter expert...

I'd be interested in the answer though...

Ultimately though all colour is something to do with the chemistry of the medium that it passes through.

Redshift is another issue entirely...

GJ

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:unsure: I wonder what makes the spot reddish -- Is this copper, iron-oxide particles ? Or a 'red-shift' effect as the vortex pulls in the energy ?

Communism.

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i think the redish color is from iron oxide particles causing a chemical reaction. Or maybe jupiter has a core that appears like a smaller mars and those storms contain super cyclones and pick up dust cause it to strewn about the storm? Well whatever that answer, that storm would certainly be insane to deal with here.

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That damn Bush and his global warming have just gone too far now.

:laugh: A friend was reading this with me and we both said the exact same thing while reading the article.

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;) Yes, Jupiter has a solid land core deep beneath the thick gas clouds. This fact has not yet been confirmed by Earth science.

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;) Yes, Jupiter has a solid land core deep beneath the thick gas clouds. This fact has not yet been confirmed by Earth science.

I am truely sick of your posts, seriously. they make no sense whatsoever. What is it that you mean by "Earth Science"? How about doing some research before making bogus posts

Nineplanets.org/jupiter

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I am truely sick of your posts, seriously. they make no sense whatsoever. What is it that you mean by "Earth Science"? How about doing some research before making bogus posts

Nineplanets.org/jupiter

According to your souce:

Jupiter probably has a core of rocky material amounting to something like 10 to 15 Earth-masses.
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  • 3 weeks later...

I heard today at work, that Jupiter has 2 big red holes on it, that are only to be explained as a volcano.. but the holes go really deep into the planet. I was wondering if there is proof of this, and if someone could explain it to me.

another note, how many meteors and comets hit jupiter daily?

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One thing to know is that Jupiter's clouds consistofa high number of storms. These storms are constantly gobbling eachother up, they tested this theory in a lab and came to the conclusion that this is how the red spot on jupiter was formed. There is no evidence, at least that i know of. saying that the red spot on the gas giant is the result of volcanic activity, as far as i know Jupiter has no rocky surface only a core.

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isn't jupiter a

gas giant

meaning _____

............ all

. gas

duh

If jupiter was all gas then it's gas or what it is, mostly made up of would have eventually have floated away, millions of years ago..... Jupiter exists as a planet because it has a core that maintains a gravitational field... thus keeping it's atmosphere intact.

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If jupiter was all gas then it's gas or what it is, mostly made up of would have eventually have floated away, millions of years ago..... Jupiter exists as a planet because it has a core that maintains a gravitational field... thus keeping it's atmosphere intact.

that's a new one on me

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