Jupiter

This article is about the planet. For the Roman god, see Jupiter (god). For other uses, see Jupiter (disambiguation).

Jupiter
An image of Jupiter taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope
Full disk view in natural colour, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in April 2014[a]
Designations
Pronunciation/ˈdʒuːpɪtər/ ⓘ[1]
Named after
Jupiter
AdjectivesJovian (/ˈdʒoʊviən/)
Symbol♃
Orbital characteristics[2]
Epoch J2000
Aphelion5.4570 AU (816.363 million km)
Perihelion4.9506 AU (740.595 million km)
5.2038 AU (778.479 million km)
Eccentricity0.0489
398.88 d
13.06 km/s
20.020°[4]
Inclination
100.464°
January 21, 2023[6]
273.867°[4]
Known satellites95 (as of 2023)[7]
Physical characteristics[2][8][9]
69911 km[b]
10.973 of Earth's
Equatorial radius
71492 km[b]
Polar radius
66854 km[b]
10.517 of Earth's
Flattening0.06487
6.1469×1010 km2
120.4 of Earth's
Volume1.4313×1015 km3[b]
1,321 of Earth's
Mass1.8982×1027 kg
Mean density
1.326 g/cm3[c]
24.79 m/s2
2.528 g0[b][11]
0.2756±0.0006[12]
59.5 km/s[b]
9.9258 h (9 h 55 m 33 s)[3]
9.9250 hours (9 h 55 m 30 s)
Equatorial rotation velocity
12.6 km/s
3.13° (to orbit)
North pole right ascension
268.057°; 17h 52m 14s[13]
North pole declination
64.495°[13]
Albedo
Temperature88 K (−185 °C) (blackbody temperature)
Surface temp. min mean max
1 bar 165 K
0.1 bar 78 K 128 K
−2.94[16] to −1.66[16]
−9.4[17]
29.8" to 50.1"
Atmosphere[2]
Surface pressure
200–600 kPa (30–90 psi)
(opaque cloud deck)[18]
27 km (17 mi)
Composition by volume

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than 2.5 times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined and slightly less than one-thousandth the mass of the Sun. Its diameter is eleven times that of Earth, and a tenth that of the Sun. Jupiter orbits the Sun at a distance of 5.20 AU (778.5 Gm), with an orbital period of 11.86 years. It is the third brightest natural object in the Earth's night sky, after the Moon and Venus, and has been observed since prehistoric times. Its name derives from that of Jupiter, the chief deity of ancient Roman religion.

Jupiter was the first of the Sun's planets to form, and its inward migration during the primordial phase of the Solar System affected much of the formation history of the other planets. Jupiter's atmosphere consists of 76% hydrogen and 24% helium by mass, with a denser interior. It contains trace elements like carbon, oxygen, sulfur, neon, ammonia, water vapour, phosphine, hydrogen sulfide, and hydrocarbons. Jupiter's helium abundance is 80% of the Sun's, similar to Saturn's composition. The ongoing contraction of Jupiter's interior generates more heat than the planet receives from the Sun. Its internal structure is believed to consist of an outer mantle of fluid metallic hydrogen and a diffuse inner core of denser material. Because of its rapid rate of rotation, one turn in ten hours, Jupiter is an oblate spheroid; it has a slight but noticeable bulge around the equator. The outer atmosphere is divided into a series of latitudinal bands, with turbulence and storms along their interacting boundaries; the most obvious result of this is the Great Red Spot, a giant storm that has been recorded since 1831.

Jupiter's magnetic field is the strongest and second-largest contiguous structure in the Solar System, generated by eddy currents within the fluid, metallic hydrogen core. The solar wind interacts with the magnetosphere, extending it outward and affecting Jupiter's orbit. Jupiter is surrounded by a faint system of planetary rings that were discovered in 1979 by Voyager 1 and further investigated by the Galileo orbiter in the 1990s. The Jovian ring system consists mainly of dust and has three main segments: an inner torus of particles known as the halo, a relatively bright main ring, and an outer gossamer ring. The rings have a reddish colour in visible and near-infrared light. The age of the ring system is unknown, possibly dating back to Jupiter's formation.

At least 95 moons orbit the planet; the four largest moons—Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto—orbit within the magnetosphere, and were discovered by Galileo Galilei in 1610. Ganymede, the largest of the four, is larger than the planet Mercury. Since 1973, Jupiter has been visited by nine robotic probes: seven flybys and two dedicated orbiters, with two more en route.


Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

  1. ^ Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C. (1989). "Jupiter". Oxford English Dictionary. Vol. 8 (2nd ed.). Clarendon. ISBN 978-0-19-861220-9.
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  3. ^ a b Seligman, Courtney. "Rotation Period and Day Length". Archived from the original on September 29, 2018. Retrieved August 13, 2009.
  4. ^ a b c d Cite error: The named reference VSOP87 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Souami_Souchay_2012 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ "HORIZONS Planet-center Batch call for January 2023 Perihelion". ssd.jpl.nasa.gov (Perihelion for Jupiter's planet-centre (599) occurs on 2023-Jan-21 at 4.9510113au during a rdot flip from negative to positive). NASA/JPL. Archived from the original on September 7, 2021. Retrieved September 7, 2021.
  7. ^ Sheppard, Scott S. "Moons of Jupiter". Earth & Planets Laboratory. Carnegie Institution for Science. Archived from the original on April 24, 2019. Retrieved December 20, 2022.
  8. ^ Seidelmann, P. Kenneth; Archinal, Brent A.; A'Hearn, Michael F.; Conrad, Albert R.; Consolmagno, Guy J.; Hestroffer, Daniel; Hilton, James L.; Krasinsky, Georgij A.; Neumann, Gregory A.; Oberst, Jürgen; Stooke, Philip J.; Tedesco, Edward F.; Tholen, David J.; Thomas, Peter C.; Williams, Iwan P. (2007). "Report of the IAU/IAG Working Group on cartographic coordinates and rotational elements: 2006". Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy. 98 (3): 155–180. Bibcode:2007CeMDA..98..155S. doi:10.1007/s10569-007-9072-y. ISSN 0923-2958.
  9. ^ de Pater, Imke; Lissauer, Jack J. (2015). Planetary Sciences (2nd updated ed.). New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 250. ISBN 978-0-521-85371-2. Retrieved August 17, 2016.
  10. ^ "Astrodynamic Constants". JPL Solar System Dynamics. February 27, 2009. Archived from the original on March 21, 2019. Retrieved August 8, 2007.
  11. ^ "NASA: Solar System Exploration: Planets: Jupiter: Facts & Figures". solarsystem.nasa.gov. June 2, 2011. Archived from the original on September 5, 2011. Retrieved October 15, 2024.
  12. ^ Ni, D. (2018). "Empirical models of Jupiter's interior from Juno data". Astronomy & Astrophysics. 613: A32. Bibcode:2018A&A...613A..32N. doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201732183.
  13. ^ a b Archinal, B. A.; Acton, C. H.; A'Hearn, M. F.; Conrad, A.; Consolmagno, G. J.; Duxbury, T.; Hestroffer, D.; Hilton, J. L.; Kirk, R. L.; Klioner, S. A.; McCarthy, D.; Meech, K.; Oberst, J.; Ping, J.; Seidelmann, P. K. (2018). "Report of the IAU Working Group on Cartographic Coordinates and Rotational Elements: 2015". Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy. 130 (3): 22. Bibcode:2018CeMDA.130...22A. doi:10.1007/s10569-017-9805-5. ISSN 0923-2958.
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  15. ^ Cite error: The named reference Mallama_et_al was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  16. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Mallama_and_Hilton was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ "Encyclopedia - the brightest bodies". IMCCE. Archived from the original on July 24, 2023. Retrieved May 29, 2023.
  18. ^ Bjoraker, G. L.; Wong, M. H.; de Pater, I.; Ádámkovics, M. (September 2015). "Jupiter's Deep Cloud Structure Revealed Using Keck Observations of Spectrally Resolved Line Shapes". The Astrophysical Journal. 810 (2): 10. arXiv:1508.04795. Bibcode:2015ApJ...810..122B. doi:10.1088/0004-637X/810/2/122. S2CID 55592285. 122.