The largest planet in Jupiter's solar system, although it is the one that once failed in the competition compared to the Sun, currently has only 1/1000th the mass of the Sun.
Well below 8 percent of the Sun's mass, which is the norm for being the coolest star, Jupiter once lost the battle with the Sun for material.
But as a planet, it is the boss of the solar system, and in any way, it is ahead of other planets.
In the solar system, the mass of the Sun alone accounts for 99.8% of the entire solar system, jupiter accounts for the remaining 0.1%, and the remaining seven planets and asteroids account for 0.1%.
This is enough to see that Jupiter, although it has not become a star, is indeed the best of the planets, and it is the mass equivalent to 317 Earths.
In addition to its massive mass, Jupiter is also very large, equivalent to more than 1300 Earths. And the most frightening thing is that such a huge body, Jupiter only needs to rotate in a short 10 hours.
Jupiter's total equatorial length is 450,000 kilometers, what is the concept, the average distance from the Earth to the moon is only 380,000 kilometers, 10 hours to complete a circle, then the equator's linear speed is as high as 12.6 kilometers per second.
This speed can escape the earth's gravitational field, but if you live on Jupiter, you don't have to worry, because its gravitational pull is very strong, and it takes at least 59.5 km/s to get rid of its gravitational force.
Such a high rotation speed also allows Jupiter's flat rate to reach 0.0648, which means that the equatorial radius is more than 4600 kilometers longer than the polar radius. Can stuff the next Mercury.
Such a high rotation speed also caused Jupiter to be a terrifying planet with storms raging and wind speeds of up to 150 m/s. The most famous is the Great Red Spot in the southern hemisphere of Jupiter.
Above is the Great Red Spot on Jupiter taken by Voyager 1, which was taken by a human probe before 2017.
But in 2017, the Juno probe was 20 times closer than Voyager 1, observing the Great Red Spot in more detail.
As early as 1665, humans discovered this huge storm on Jupiter, which has been raging to this day. The picture above is the Great Red Spot taken by the Pioneer 10 probe in the 1970s, and it is obvious that the Great Red Spot was larger at this time.
The longest distance is 40,000 kilometers wide and can lay down three Earths. And the location is also lower latitude.
Above is the Large Red Spot photographed by Juno, which can clearly be seen becoming closer to round than before, and its volume is gradually getting smaller, from the previous widest 40,000 kilometers, and to 24,000 kilometers.
Compared with the earth, there is only one earth to be put down. Scientists estimate that at this rate of decay, by 2040, the once Great Red Spot will be smaller than Earth's size and closer to a perfect circle.
From the comparison map of the three periods taken by Hubble Telescope, it can be clearly seen that the shape of the Great Red Spot changes. Why is the Great Red Spot shrinking?
Surely the storm wasn't as strong as it used to be. The main reason is that the Great Red Spot has been drifting in a direction close to the equator. Due to the relatively slow motion between Jupiter's atmospheres at the equator, this deprives the Great Red Spot of power.
So the storm will show red, and why does Jupiter's atmosphere take on a colorful color?
In fact, the main components of Jupiter are hydrogen and helium, which account for 75% and 24% of Jupiter's mass, respectively, and the remaining 1% are other elements. Don't underestimate this 1%, know that Jupiter's mass is very large.
In its center there is a core of iron cobalt, the outer layer is the formation of liquid metal hydrogen at high temperature and pressure, and then up is the atmosphere, which in addition to hydrogen and helium, also contains a lot of organic compounds, phosphine, hydrogen sulfide ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, methane, ammonia and so on.
So Jupiter's atmosphere is still quite complex, so it takes on a variety of colors.
Because Jupiter's equator, high latitude and even extremely low temperature difference is not enough, coupled with its rotation speed is very fast, so on Jupiter will only blow east-west winds, not north-south winds, which forms Jupiter's atmosphere looks distinct between layers.
Storms are most likely to form at high latitudes where interlayer-to-layer convection is strong.
Most recently, on August 25, hubble once again observed jupiter's Great Red Spot and found that the rate of shrinking of the Great Red Spot is slowing down.
At the same time, jupiter's northern hemisphere found a new storm in the high latitudes of Jupiter's northern hemisphere, and scientists expect that this storm will form a stable structure in the future, even continue to grow larger, and eventually surpass the shrinking Great Red Spot to become the largest storm on Jupiter.
This is the part of the red circle in the image above. The storm is currently bright white and still looks small, but it has been extending and moving at a speed of 560 kilometers per hour.
In the past, it was normal for some small storms to suddenly appear on Jupiter, after all, Jupiter's atmosphere used to be too convective, but these storms were very unstable, and the duration was not very long, disappearing in a few weeks or months.
But this discovery of this formed storm, scientists believe it has stable characteristics, will continue to grow in the future.
At the same time, two photos were taken, the above one is the classic appearance of Jupiter in visible light, this photo in addition to visible light, but also in the infrared and ultraviolet bands of Jupiter was observed, composited the above picture.
Jupiter was 653 million kilometers from Earth at the time of the photo shoot, and jupiter's moon, Europa, is considered the most likely planet in the solar system to have life.
Although its surface is covered with thick layers of ice and does not feel the heat from the sun, its distance is just right from Jupiter, not very close, and volcanoes like Ganymede are everywhere, nor very far.
Jupiter's tidal gravity on it is just the right place to heat Europa's interior, allowing Europa to have an ocean of liquid water beneath its frozen surface.
And there will be geysers, spewing water vapor up to tens of kilometers from the thick ice sheet. The future of Europa is also the place where we land in search of life.
While we don't have any probes right now that can get into Jupiter, or even land on liquid hydrogen inside Jupiter's interior, we can imagine that the world is unfriendly to anything, based on what we see from Jupiter's atmosphere.
Not to mention life, even a probe made of metal inside Jupiter will not be able to survive to land because of high temperature and pressure. This is the most terrifying place in the solar system.