NASA shares incredible image revealing gigantic oval storms on Jupiter’s cloudscape

NASA’s Juno aircraft, which has been on a mission to Jupiter for nearly a year, has released some stunning pictures of the planet, revealing its south pole in a jaw-dropping detail. Citizen scientist Gabriel Fiset has created the image using the data provided by the JunoCam that sits atop the NASA Juno probe, according to a report in Daily Mail.

The breath-taking picture also reveals dozens of gigantic oval storms on Jupiter’s cloudscape. “Approaching the pole, the organised turbulence of Jupiter’s belts and zones transitions into clusters of unorganized filamentary structures, streams of air that resemble giant tangled strings,” NASA said in a statement.

NASA has also released the raw images captured by the JunoCam and are available at the official website of JunoCam. The pictures of Jupiter come weeks after NASA Cassini probe showed the ‘watercolor world’ of Saturn in unprecedented detail.

According to reports, astronomers are stunned by the bizarre swirling patterns on Jupiter. However, according to NASA, ‘megawinds’ that are one of the fastest in the solar system (1,100 mph) have given birth to these swirling patterns.

“When imaged at infrared wavelengths that pierce the planet’s upper haze layer, the high-speed winds of Saturn’s atmosphere produce watercolor-like patterns,” NASA said.

NASA also said that winds on Jupiter can reach up to a speed of more than 1,100 miles per hour (1,800 kilometers per hour) given the fact that there is an absence of any solid surface creating atmospheric drag.

ALSO READ | NASA JunoCam captures breathtaking pictures of Jupiter as Juno spacecraft performs close flyby

NASA says practically every element necessary for life had been discovered in the same place in the solar systems – on one of Saturn’s icy moons.

Juno probe’s first data was presented at the annual conference of the European Geosciences Union. 

ALSO READ | NASA Juno spacecraft skims 2,700 miles over Jupiter’s cloud tops, JunoCam releases breath-taking images

Oval storms dot the cloudscape in this new #CitizenScientist created image of #Jupiter using data from @NASAJuno: https://t.co/S4P0Kz0EzW pic.twitter.com/8qa7Yvh5sq

— NASA (@NASA) May 6, 2017