Extraordinary images of Jupiter have been made possible by the world’s biggest and most space telescope: the James Webb Space Telescope!
Back in July, JWST captured pictures of the giant planet in the solar system. Now, we get the chance to see Jupiter in its full glory.
Read out below to find out more intriguing details.
Jupiter Seen As Never Before!
JWST’s mission is ambitious and on point, and there’s plenty of proof to support that. The space telescope delivers essential data about our Solar System and helps scientists in unveiling space mysteries.
According to researchers, the new photos depict Jupiter’s surrounding auroras, moons, rings, and enormous storms in remarkable clarity. We really praised JWST’s work and expect even more in the future!
To make the characteristics stand out, the infrared photos were colored artificially (the human eye cannot see infrared light). So, that helps us quite a lot to understand Jupiter a bit more. Check out an extraordinary photo of the planet below:
Imke de Pater of the University of California is a planetary astronomer and played a huge part in the project. She released a statement:
We’ve never seen Jupiter like this. It’s all quite incredible, […] We hadn’t really expected it to be this good, to be honest.
According to NASA, auroras could be seen extending to great heights over both the southern and northern poles of Jupiter in the picture above. That was produced from a composite of many telescopic photographs. How intriguing!
The JWST was sent into orbit in December 2021 and is now almost one million miles (1.6 million kilometers) from Earth. The best is that the telescope can detect light that started moving towards Earth 13 billion years ago, just after the Big Bang.
The space telescope is also anticipated to be a significant force in discovery for at least the next two decades and is seen as the Hubble telescope’s successor.