NASA - JUNO Mission logo.
Nov 10, 2021
During its 36th low pass over Jupiter, NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured this view of striking cloud bands and swirls in the giant planet’s mid-southern latitudes. The dark, circular vortex near the center of the image is a cyclone that spans roughly 250 miles (about 400 kilometers). The color at its center is likely to be the result of descending winds that cleared out upper-level clouds, revealing darker material below.
Citizen scientist Brian Swift used a raw JunoCam image digitally projected onto a sphere to create this view. It has been rotated so that north is up. The original image was taken on Sept. 2, 2021, at 4:09 p.m. PDT (7:09 p.m. EDT). At the time, the spacecraft was about 16,800 miles (about 27,000 kilometers) above Jupiter’s cloud tops, at a latitude of about 31 degrees south.
JUNO orbiting around Jupiter
JunoCam’s raw images are available for the public to peruse and process into image products. More information about NASA citizen science can be found on our NASA Solve page and our NASA Science site.
Related links:
JunoCam: https://missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam/processing
NASA Solve page: https://www.nasa.gov/solve/opportunities/citizenscience
NASA Science site: https://science.nasa.gov/citizenscience
Juno spacecraft: https://www.nasa.gov/juno
Image data: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Image processing by Brian Swift © CC BY/Animation: NASA/Text Credits: NASA/Michael Bock.
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