Jupiter (Planet) -- Photographs from space; Jupiter probes; Voyager Project
The Jupiter of Pioneers 10 and 11 was quite unlike the planet seen by
Voyager 1. At the time of the Pioneer exploration, the Great Red Spot,
embedded in a huge white zone, was more uniformly colored, and pale
brown bands circled the northern hemisphere. In the intervening years,
the south temperate latitudes have changed completely, developing the
complex turbulent clouds seen around the Red Spot by Voyager 1. Yet,
even between the two Voyagers, Jupiter appeared to be undergoing a
dynamic “facelift.” At a quick glance, Voyager 2 photographs showed the
visage that had been familiar since early in 1979, but a closer look
showed that it is not quite the same. The white band below the Great Red
Spot, fairly broad during the first flyby, had become a thin white
ribbon where it rims the southern edge of the Spot. The turbulence to
the west of the Red Spot had stretched out and become “blander” than it
was before. Small rotating clouds seemed to be forming out of the waves
in this region. The cloud structure that had been east of the Red Spot
during the Voyager 1 flyby spread out, covering the northern boundary
and preventing small clouds from circling the huge red oval. The Red
Spot itself also changed. Its northern boundary seemed—at least
visually—to be more set off from the clouds that surround it, and the
feature appeared to be more uniform in color, perhaps reverting back to
the personality it had in Pioneer days.
[Illustration: Jupiter’s cloud patterns changed significantly in the
few months between the two Voyager flybys. Most of the changes are
the result of differential rotation, in which the prevailing winds
at different latitudes shift long-lived features with respect to
those north or south. Thus, for example, the three large white ovals
shifted nearly 90 degrees in longitude, relative to the Great Red
Spot, between March and July. [P-21599]]
[Illustration: Cloud patterns from Voyager 2.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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