Jupiter
Cloud bands are clearly visible on Jupiter. Credit: NASA/JPL/USGS.

Jupiter is the largest planet in the Solar System and contains nearly 3/4 of all planetary matter.

With no solid surface, Jupiter is a gas and liquid filled giant. Its turbulent belts of clouds circulate parallel to the equator and often contain oval spots which are storm systems with the largest being easily twice the diameter of Earth. The great red spot has been observed for at least 300 years and rotates counter-clockwise with wind speeds of 270 miles per hour [430 km/hr].

Although observed and studied from Earth for centuries it wasn't until the mid 1970's that humans were able to get a closer look with the spacecraft Pioneer 10 and 11. The Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft were launched with the specific purpose of collecting information and data on the Jovian worlds. In December 1995 the Galileo spacecraft entered into orbit and began it's long-term study of Jupiter and it's moons, a probe was also sent deep into the atmosphere of the gas giant.

Selected radiation astronomy

Meteors

The data in the Jupiter map shown here were taken during Hubble Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy program observations of Jupiter on Jan. 19, 2015, from 2:00 UT to 12:30 UT. Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Simon (GSFC), M. Wong (UC Berkeley), G. Orton (JPL-Caltech), and G. Bacon (STScI).{{free media}}

"Scientists using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have produced new global maps of Jupiter – the first in a series of annual portraits of the solar system's outer planets from the Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy program (OPAL). The two Jupiter maps, representing nearly back-to-back rotations of the planet on Jan. 19, 2015, show the movements of the clouds and make it possible to determine the speeds of Jupiter's winds. The Hubble observations confirm that the Great Red Spot continues to shrink and become more circular. In addition, an unusual wispy filament is seen, spanning almost the entire width of the vortex. These findings are described in a new paper published online in the October 10 issue of The Astrophysical Journal."[1]

References

  1. Amy Simon (19 January 2015). Hubble's Planetary Portrait Captures New Changes in Jupiter's Great Red Spot. Baltimore, Maryland USA: Hubblesite. http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2015-37. Retrieved 19 June 2018. 
Selected topic

Object astronomy

File:Haze blankets smaller red spot.jpg
This false-color view of Jupiter was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2006. Credit: NASA, ESA, I. de Pater and M. Wong (University of California, Berkeley).

"[T]he ancients’ religions and mythology speak for their knowledge of Uranus; the dynasty of gods had Uranus followed by Saturn, and the latter by Jupiter."[1]

"This false-color view of Jupiter [on the right] was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2006. The red color traces high-altitude haze blankets in the polar regions, equatorial zone, the Great Red Spot, and a second red spot below and to the left of its larger cousin. The smaller red spot is approximately as wide as Earth."[2]

"NASA's Hubble Space Telescope is giving astronomers their most detailed view yet of a second red spot emerging on Jupiter. For the first time in history, astronomers have witnessed the birth of a new red spot on the giant planet, which is located half a billion miles away. The storm is roughly one-half the diameter of its bigger and legendary cousin, the Great Red Spot. Researchers suggest that the new spot may be related to a possible major climate change in Jupiter's atmosphere. These images were taken with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys on April 8 and 16, 2006."[2]

References

  1. Immanuel Velikovsky. Uranus. The Immanuel Velikovsky Archive. http://www.varchive.org/itb/uranus.htm#f_1. Retrieved 2013-01-14. 
  2. 2.0 2.1 I. de Pater and M. Wong (4 May 2006). Hubble Snaps Baby Pictures of Jupiter's "Red Spot Jr.". Baltimore, Maryland USA: HubbleSite. http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2006-19/20-jupiter. Retrieved 2017-02-12. 
Selected astronomy

Jupiter systems

Jupiter rings are photographed by Voyager 2 (false color). Credit: NASA, Voyager 2.

Center is a Voyager 2 image of Jupiter's rings.

Selected deity

Marduk

Marduk and his dragon Mušḫuššu is from a Babylonian cylinder seal.[1] Credit: RuM.

~2800 b2k: The observation of Jupiter dates back to the Babylonian astronomers of the 7th or 8th century BC.[2] To the Babylonians, this object represented their god Marduk. They used the roughly 12-year orbit of this planet along the ecliptic to define the constellations of their zodiac.[3][4]

Marduk Sumerian: amar utu.k "calf of the sun; solar calf"; Greek Μαρδοχαῖος,[5]

"Marduk" is the Babylonian form of his name.[6]

The name Marduk was probably pronounced Marutuk.[7] The etymology of the name Marduk is conjectured as derived from amar-Utu ("bull calf of the sun god Utu").[6] The origin of Marduk's name may reflect an earlier genealogy, or have had cultural ties to the ancient city of Sippar (whose god was Utu, the sun god), dating back to the third millennium BC.[8]

By the Hammurabi period, Marduk had become astrologically associated with the planet Jupiter.[9]

Marduk's original character is obscure but he was later associated with water, vegetation, judgment, and magic.[10] His consort was the goddess Sarpanit.[11] He was also regarded as the son of Ea[12] (Sumerian Enki) and Damgalnuna (Damkina)[13] and the heir of Anu, but whatever special traits Marduk may have had were overshadowed by the political development through which the Euphrates valley passed and which led to people of the time imbuing him with traits belonging to gods who in an earlier period were recognized as the heads of the pantheon.[14]

Leonard W. King in The Seven Tablets of Creation (1902) included fragments of god lists which he considered essential for the reconstruction of the meaning of Marduk's name. Franz Bohl in his 1936 study of the fifty names also referred to King's list. Richard Litke (1958) noticed a similarity between Marduk's names in the An:Anum list and those of the Enuma elish, albeit in a different arrangement.

The connection between the An:Anum list and the list in Enuma Elish were established by Walther Sommerfeld (1982), who used the correspondence to argue for a Kassite period composition date of the Enuma elish, although the direct derivation of the Enuma elish list from the An:Anum one was disputed in a review by Wilfred Lambert (1984).[15]

Marduk prophesies that he will return once more to Babylon to a messianic new king, who will bring salvation to the city and who will wreak a terrible revenge on the Elamites. This king is understood to be Nebuchadnezzar I (Nabu-kudurri-uṣur I), 1125-1103 BC.[16]

References

  1. Willis, Roy (2012). World Mythology. New York: Metro Books. p. 62. ISBN 978-1-4351-4173-5. 
  2. A. Sachs (May 2, 1974). "Babylonian Observational Astronomy". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London (Royal Society of London) 276 (1257): 43–50 (see p. 44). doi:10.1098/rsta.1974.0008. 
  3. Eric Burgess (1982). By Jupiter: Odysseys to a Giant. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-05176-X. 
  4. Rogers, J. H. (1998). "Origins of the ancient constellations: I. The Mesopotamian traditions". Journal of the British Astronomical Association, 108: 9–28. 
  5. identified with Marduk by Heinrich Zimmeren (1862-1931), Stade's Zeitschrift 11, p. 161.
  6. 6.0 6.1 Helmer Ringgren, (1974) Religions of The Ancient Near East, Translated by John Sturdy, The Westminster Press, p. 66.
  7. Frymer-Kensky, Tikva (2005). Jones, Lindsay. ed. Marduk. Encyclopedia of religion. 8 (2 ed.). New York. pp. 5702–5703. ISBN 0-02-865741-1. 
  8. The Encyclopedia of Religion - Macmillan Library Reference USA - Vol. 9 - Page 201
  9. Jastrow, Jr., Morris (1911). Aspects of Religious Belief and Practice in Babylonia and Assyria, G.P. Putnam's Sons: New York and London. pp. 217-219.
  10. [John L. McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible, Simon & Schuster, 1965 p 541.]
  11. Helmer Ringgren, (1974) Religions of The Ancient Near East, Translated by John Sturdy, The Westminster Press, p. 67.
  12. Arendzen, John (1908). Cosmogony, In: The Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04405c.htm. Retrieved 26 March 2011. 
  13. C. Scott Littleton (2005). Gods, Goddesses and Mythology, Volume 6. Marshall Cavendish. p. 829. 
  14. Morris Jastrow (1911). Aspects of Religious Belief and Practice in Babylonia and Assyria. G. P. Putnam’s Sons. p. 38. 
  15. Andrea Seri, The Fifty Names of Marduk in Enuma elis, Journal of the American Oriental Society 126.4 (2006)
  16. Matthew Neujahr (2006). "Royal Ideology and Utopian Futures in the Akkadian Ex Eventu Prophecies". In Ehud Ben Zvi. Utopia and Dystopia in Prophetic Literature. Helsinki: The Finnish Exegetical Society, University of Helsinki. pp. 41–54. 
Selected image

This image of Jupiter shows concentrations of auroral X-rays near the north and south magnetic poles. The Chandra X-ray Observatory accumulated X-ray counts from Jupiter for its entire 10-hour rotation on December 18, 2000. Credit: NASA/CXC/SWRI/G.R.Gladstone et al.

The Chandra X-ray Observatory accumulated X-ray counts from Jupiter for its entire 10-hour rotation on December 18, 2000. Note that X-rays from the entire globe of Jupiter are detected.

Selected meteor

Clouds

This image captures swirling cloud belts and tumultuous vortices within Jupiter’s northern hemisphere. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstädt /Seán Doran.{{free media}}

"NASA’s Juno spacecraft took this color-enhanced image at 10:23 p.m. PDT on May 23, 2018 (1:23 a.m. EDT on May 24), as the spacecraft performed its 13th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time, Juno was about 9,600 miles (15,500 kilometers) from the planet's cloud tops, above a northern latitude of 56 degrees."[1]

"The region seen here is somewhat chaotic and turbulent, given the various swirling cloud formations. In general, the darker cloud material is deeper in Jupiter’s atmosphere, while bright cloud material is high. The bright clouds are most likely ammonia or ammonia and water, mixed with a sprinkling of unknown chemical ingredients."[1]

"A bright oval at bottom center stands out in the scene. This feature appears uniformly white in ground-based telescope observations. However, with JunoCam we can observe the fine-scale structure within this weather system, including additional structures within it. There is not significant motion apparent in the interior of this feature; like the Great Red Spot, its winds probably slows down greatly toward the center."[1]

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 Gerald Eichstädt Seán Doran (22 June 2018). Chaotic Clouds of Jupiter. Washington, DC USA: NASA. https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/902/chaotic-clouds-of-jupiter/?category=planets_jupiter. Retrieved 29 June 2018. 
Selected moon

Europa

This image shows two views of the trailing hemisphere of Jupiter's ice-covered satellite, Europa. The left view shows the approximate natural color appearance of Europa. Credit: NASA/Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V., Berlin, Germany.

The image is a composite of two views of Europa. The left view shows the approximate natural color appearance of Europa. The view on the right is a false-color composite version combining violet, green and infrared images to enhance color differences in the predominantly water-ice crust of Europa. Dark brown areas represent rocky material derived from the interior, implanted by impact, or from a combination of interior and exterior sources. Bright plains in the polar areas (top and bottom) are shown in tones of blue to distinguish possibly coarse-grained ice (dark blue) from fine-grained ice (light blue). Long, dark lines are fractures in the crust, some of which are more than 3,000 kilometers (1,850 miles) long. The bright feature containing a central dark spot in the lower third of the image is a young impact crater some 50 kilometers (31 miles) in diameter. This crater has been provisionally named "Pwyll" for the Celtic god of the underworld. This image was taken on September 7, 1996, at a range of 677,000 kilometers (417,900 miles) by the solid state imaging television camera onboard the Galileo spacecraft during its second orbit around Jupiter.

Selected theory

Jupiter systems

"A definite color gradient is observed [in the small inner satellites of Jupiter], with the satellites closer to Jupiter being redder: the mean violet/green ratio (0.42/0.56 μm) decreases from Thebe to Metis. This ratio also is lower for the trailing sides of Thebe and Amalthea than for their leading sides."[1]

References

  1. P.C. Thomas, J.A. Burns, L. Rossier, D. Simonelli, J. Veverka, C.R. Chapman, K. Klaasen, T.V. Johnson, M.J.S. Belton, Galileo Solid State Imaging Team (September 1998). "The Small Inner Satellites of Jupiter". Icarus 135 (1): 360-71. doi:10.1006/icar.1998.5976. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103598959760. Retrieved 2012-06-01.