Jupiter – A Darker View

Venus and Jupiter

Observant sky watchers will have noticed that the two brightest planets in our skies have been drawing close together. Jupiter and Venus are currently about 2° apart. Sunday evening will see them at their closest for viewers in the islands at just under 1.5° apart. Monday will see the pair very slightly further apart at just over 1.5° separation.

Conjunction — Venus and Jupiter over the Keck 1 dome

After Monday the two will gradually separate further with Jupiter disappearing into the sunset in mid-December while Venus continues to climb further from the Sun until maximum elongation on March 24, 2020.

On Wednesday the 27th a thin crescent Moon will join these bright planets, just 5° below Jupiter. On Thursday the 28th the Moon will be 4° above Venus. The three should make for quite a spectacular sight in the glow of sunset.

A degree and a half separation will allow both to fit in the field of view of very low power telescopes and binoculars, a bit much to fit both in the field of view of most telescopes.

Jupiter at Opposition

Jupiter will pass through opposition at 05:11HST today.

Jupiter 14Apr2016 — Jupiter on April 15, 2016

Jupiter orbits the Sun once every 11.86 years. As the giant planet continues on its way the Earth swings around much faster on our inside track. As a result we lap Jupiter once every 399 days, passing between the planet and the Sun. During opposition Jupiter will rise at sunset, transit at midnight, and set at dawn. This makes the planet available for observation for the entire night.

Look for a bright object rising in the eastern sky after sunset. It is difficult to mistake for anything else, shining at it’s brightest during opposition, a brilliant -2.7 magnitude. For the remainder of the spring and much of the summer, the planet will be quite prominent in the evening sky.

Venus in the Daytime

With the Moon only a half a degree from Venus this morning, it should be relatively easy to spot the brilliant planet high in the daytime sky.

Crescent Venus — Venus approaching inferior conjunction, 24Dec2013

Spotting planets in the daytime is not that difficult, both Jupiter and Venus are bright enough to seen in full daylight. Venus is currently near maximum brilliance at about -4.3 magnitude, easily bright enough to see in a clear sky. There are a few helpful hints to make this easier.

Today the Moon will make finding Venus quite easy. The planet is only half a degree above the Moon, just above the slim crescent. Keep in mind that the Moon is half a degree across, the planet will be half a Moon diameter above the unlit side, easy to spot in the mid-morning sky. Having the Moon nearby will not only aid in locating the Planet, it will also provide your eyes something to focus on.

Fly Over Jupiter

Take a series of photos from the Juno spacecraft and just project them in sequence to make a timelapse movie of the spacecraft swinging past Jupiter. Sounds easy… Right?

Not easy at all. As the spacecraft orbited past the planet the perspective changes rapidly. To make a natural seeming animation much more would have to be done. Mathematician Gerald Eichstaedt did just that… Taking 36 images he projected each image on a mathematically modeled sphere, then panned through each image using the orbital trajectory of the spacecraft to create a view to simulate actually being there.

Further work by filmmaker Seán Doran smoothed the resulting video into an even more natural view. This created the video posted below. You can see the original video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuOy-shbQuM&feature=youtu.be

The result is simply stunning, take look at what it would have been like to be there as Juno swung past the planet just a few thousand miles above the cloudtops.

Jupiter: Juno Perijove 06 from Sean Doran on Vimeo.

By Jove!

Jupiter from Juno — A spectacular image taken by the Juno spacecraft just above the cloud tops of Jupiter.
Waves of clouds at 37.8 degrees latitude dominate this three-dimensional Jovian cloudscape, courtesy of NASA’s Juno spacecraft. JunoCam obtained this enhanced-color picture on May 19, 2017, at 5:50 UTC from an altitude of 5,500 miles (8,900 kilometers).
Image credit: NASA/SWRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstadt/Sean Doran

A Whole New Jupiter: First Science Results from NASA’s Juno Mission

JPL Press Release…

Early science results from NASA’s Juno mission to Jupiter portray the largest planet in our solar system as a complex, gigantic, turbulent world, with Earth-sized polar cyclones, plunging storm systems that travel deep into the heart of the gas giant, and a mammoth, lumpy magnetic field that may indicate it was generated closer to the planet’s surface than previously thought.

Jupiter South Pole from Juno — This image shows Jupiter’s south pole, as seen by NASA’s Juno spacecraft from an altitude of 32,000 miles (52,000 kilometers). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Betsy Asher Hall/Gervasio Robles

“We are excited to share these early discoveries, which help us better understand what makes Jupiter so fascinating,” said Diane Brown, Juno program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “It was a long trip to get to Jupiter, but these first results already demonstrate it was well worth the journey.”

Juno launched on Aug. 5, 2011, entering Jupiter’s orbit on July 4, 2016. The findings from the first data-collection pass, which flew within about 2,600 miles (4,200 kilometers) of Jupiter’s swirling cloud tops on Aug. 27, are being published this week in two papers in the journal Science, as well as 44 papers in Geophysical Research Letters.

Continue reading “A Whole New Jupiter: First Science Results from NASA’s Juno Mission”

Jupiter at Opposition

Jupiter will pass through opposition at 10:58HST today.

Jove — Jupiter and the moons Europa, Ganymede and Callisto (left-right)

Venus in the Daytime

With the Moon only a few degrees from Venus this afternoon, it should be relatively easy to spot the brilliant planet long before sunset.

Venus 28May2012 — Venus photographed on 28May2012, about 13° from the Sun in the mid-afternoon sky

Spotting planets in the daytime is not that difficult, both Jupiter and Venus are bright enough to seen in full daylight. Venus is currently near maximum brilliance at about -4.6 magnitude, easily bright enough to see in a clear sky. There are a few helpful hints to make this easier.

Today the Moon will aid finding Venus in the sky as it is about 5° north of the Moon. Having the Moon nearby will not only aid in locating the Planet, it will also provide your eyes something to focus on.

Of course these bright objects will be even more dramatic after sunset when Mars will also be visible nearby.

Long-term, hi-res tracking of eruptions on Jupiter’s moon Io

UC Berkeley press release…

NIRC2 image of Io — A NIRC2 image of Jupiter’s Moon Io

Jupiter’s moon Io continues to be the most volcanically active body in the solar system, as documented by the longest series of frequent, high-resolution observations of the moon’s thermal emission ever obtained.

Using near-infrared adaptive optics on two of the world’s largest telescopes — the 10-meter Keck II and the 8-meter Gemini North, both located near the summit of the dormant volcano Maunakea in Hawaii — UC Berkeley astronomers tracked 48 volcanic hot spots on the surface over a period of 29 months from August 2013 through the end of 2015.

“On a given night, we may see half a dozen or more different hot spots,” said Katherine de Kleer, a UC Berkeley graduate student who led the observations. “Of Io’s hundreds of active volcanoes, we have been able to track the 50 that were the most powerful over the past few years.”

Continue reading “Long-term, hi-res tracking of eruptions on Jupiter’s moon Io”

Conjunction

Only once before have I seen Jupiter and Venus this close, many years ago. Being close enough to fit in the same eyepiece field is quite interesting, particularly with enough magnification to see the moons and planet details well.

If you have not been paying attention the evening planet dance is in full swing, Mercury, Venus and Jupiter all in close attendance.

This evening was the close approach of Jupiter and Venus. I set up a telescope briefly to capture the conjunction. More than a little overexposed, but you can see the moons of Jupiter this way…