NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), touted as the world’s largest and most powerful telescope, has captured some interesting pictures of Jupiter. In addition to powerful winds and giant storms, the new images also feature some spectacular auroras on the gas giant. The images offer some intricate details of Jupiter that scientists think may shed more light on its inner life. The observatory’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) was used to capture the images. With three special infrared filters, the instrument delivers detailed data on the planet. However, infrared light is not visible to the human eye and thus, scientists processed the captured light, bringing it under the visible range.
a standalone Picture Jupiter was formed by piecing together several images from the Webb telescope. This shows the aurora extending to the higher altitudes of the planet above both the north and south poles. Aurora appears brighter as it shines through a filter mapped to red.
The image also highlights light reflected from the lower clouds and upper haze on Jupiter. The haze is also seen moving around the north and south poles in a separate filter mapped to green and yellow. Another filter, mapped to blue, shows light reflected from a dark main cloud. The colors are due to the mapping done by scientists. The longest wavelength appears red while the shortest wavelength appears blue in images.
The image also offers a view of the Great Red Spot, a well-known and massive storm capable of swallowing Earth. The spot and its clouds appear white in the image because they reflect a lot of sunlight.
“The brightness here indicates higher altitudes – so the Great Red Spot has high altitude haze, as does the equatorial region. Many bright white ‘spots’ and ‘ridges’ form very high altitude clouds of condensed convective storms Likely to be,” said Heidi Hamel, Webb interdisciplinary scientist for Solar System Observations and vice president of science at AURA.
Jupiter’s wide field of view has faint rings that are a million times fainter than the planet itself. Its two smaller moons, Amalthea and Adrastia, are also visible in the image.
