Image by NASA
Everyone
knows that Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system. But is it a
planet or a star?
On
July 4, 2016, NASA's Juno spacecraft entered Jupiter's orbit. Armed with state
of the art camera's, NASA's science team lead by Scott Bolton were pleasantly
surprised beyond their expectations. Stunning images were captured in abundance
and papers were written and published.
It
was determined that, contrary to previous predictions Jupiter's magnetic filed
was twice as strong as expected. There were also stunning auroras a-glow on
Jupiter's poles which appear like pastel colored cyclones.
Jupiter's
body is equally violent with swirling storms of dark light and pastel colors. A
glimpse within Jupiter's atmosphere reveals ammonia emanating from deep within
the planet which the science team deemed to may be the cause of the violent
weather systems in Jupiter.
Image by NASA.
Jupiter's
moniker as a failed sun is came from the elements of hydrogen and helium that
pervade both the planet and our Sun. However, Jupiter is much much smaller than
the Sun for which reason, there is not enough internal pressure within Jupiter
to cause Hydrogen to fuse to Helium which is fuels the Sun's energy. It is theorized that during the birthing
process of our solar system, the Sun grabbed much of the mass the Jupiter could
have which is why we only have one sun. (To restate Dr. Alex Rudolf, professor
of Physics at California State University)
In
1995, NASA decided to crash the Galileo spacecraft into Jupiter. Galileo had a
Plutonium thermal reactor which scientists feard would ignite Jupiter into
becoming a second Sun. Since we do not have a second star at present, the
cataclysm obviously didn't happen.
However,
there are still some scientists who theorize that Jupiter's mass is enough to
sustain a deuterium fusion reaction and ignite the gas giant. The problem or
redemption lies again with Jupiter's mass - it will take 13 times more of
Jupiter's mass for it to become a brown dwarf star.
For
now, Jupiter remains a gass giant planet.
Image by NASA
