NASA / Jupiter / Hubble's New Portrait of Jupiter Poster

NASA / Jupiter / Hubble's New Portrait of Jupiter Source: NASA, ESA, A. Simon (Goddard Space Flight Centre), and M.H. Wong (University of California, Berkeley) Published: August 12, 2019 Historical Date: June 27, 2019 This new Hubble Space Telescope view of Jupiter, taken on June 27, 2019, reveals the giant planet's trademark Great Red Spot, and a more intense colour palette in the clouds swirling in Jupiter's turbulent atmosphere than seen in previous years. The colours, and their changes, provide important clues to ongoing processes in Jupiter's atmosphere. The bands are created by differences in the thickness and height of the ammonia ice clouds. The colourful bands, which flow in opposite directions at various latitudes, result from different atmospheric pressures. Lighter bands rise higher and have thicker clouds than the darker bands. Among the most striking features in the image are the rich colours of the clouds moving toward the Great Red Spot, a storm rolling counterclockwise between two bands of clouds. These two cloud bands, above and below the Great Red Spot, are moving in opposite directions. The red band above and to the right (northeast) of the Great Red Spot contains clouds moving westward and around the north of the giant tempest. The white clouds to the left (southwest) of the storm are moving eastward to the south of the spot.