| Piú viste - Jupiter: the "King" and His Moons |
Europa-Chaotic_Terrain-Conamara_Chaos-PIA01181.jpgConamara Chaos Region on Europa (HR)70 visiteThis view of the Conamara Chaos region on Jupiter's moon Europa shows cliffs along the edges of high-standing ice plates. The washboard texture of the older terrain has been broken into plates which are separated by material with a jumbled texture. The cliffs themselves are rough and broadly scalloped, and smooth debris shed from the cliff faces is piled along the base. For scale, the height of the cliffs and size of the scalloped indentations are comparable to the famous cliff face of Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.
This image was taken on December 16, 1997 at a range of 900 Km (540 miles) by the Solid State Imaging System Camera on Galileo spacecraft. North is to the top right of the picture and the sun illuminates the surface from the east. This image, centered at approx. 8° North Latitude and 273° West Longitude, covers an area approx. 1,5 by 4 Km (about 0,9 by 2,4 miles). The resolution is 9 mt (30 feet) per picture element.
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Io-lor_0035222842_0x630_sci_2.jpgMoments of Tvashtar (3)70 visitenessun commentoMareKromium
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Himalia from 4,4MKM.jpgHimalia from 4,4 MKM69 visiteCassini spacecraft captured images of Himalia, the brightest of Jupiter's outer moons, on Dec. 19, 2000, from a distance of 4,4 MKM.
This near-infrared image, with a resolution of about 27 Km (such as roughly 17 miles) per pixel, indicates that the side of Himalia facing the spacecraft is ,ore or less 160 Km (about 100 miles) in the up-down direction. Himalia probably has a non-spherical shape. Scientists believe it is a body captured into orbit around Jupiter, most likely an irregularly shaped asteroid. In the main frame, an arrow indicates Himalia. North is up. The inset shows the little moon magnified by a factor of 10, plus a graphic indicating Himalia's size and the direction of lighting (with sunlight coming from the left). Cassini's pictures of Himalia were taken during a brief period when Cassini's attitude was stabilized by thrusters instead of by a steadier reaction-wheel system. No spacecraft or telescope had previously shown any of Jupiter's outer moons as more than a "star-like" single dot.
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IO 7.jpgIo & Jupiter (from Voyager 2)69 visiteUn'immagine da guardare in parallelo ad un altro "transito" di Io davanti a Giove: questo è un frame (eccezionale!) Voyager 2; il precedente, come ricorderete, era un frame Cassini. Tecnologicamente parlando, c'è un "abisso" tra la Sonda Voyager e la Sonda Cassini ma, alla prova delle immagini, i risultati "visivi" ottenuti sono sostanzialmente analoghi. E questa è un'altra ragione della nostra diffidenza nei confronti della NASA (e dell'ESA): se negli Anni '70 ed '80 eravamo già capaci di simili risultati, come mai oggi, AD 2005, non siamo neppure in grado di dire quali sìano i veri colori e le vere (da un punto di vista dell'occhio umano) "sfumature" di Marte, Giove e Saturno? Eravamo bravissimi 25 anni fa e "stupidi" adesso, oppure non avevamo capito niente 25 anni fa mentre ora tutto e chiaro (si fa per dire)? O forse NON c'è stata reale "evoluzione" da un punto di vista tecnologico? O magari la "Verità" è così incredibile che divulgarla è ritenuto periglioso?
Domande: sempre domande...
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Europa-Lineae-Agenor_Linea-PIA00877.jpgThe "Agenor Linea" on Europa69 visitenessun commento
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Io-sulphur_s role-PIA02547_modest.jpgThe Role of Sulphur in Io's Volcanoes69 visiteCaption NASA originale:"Sulphur gas, consisting of pairs of sulphur atoms (S2) - as detected above Io's volcano Pele by the HST in October 1999 - is ejected from the hot vents of Io's volcanoes (green arrow). Such sulphur gas lands on the cold surface where the sulphur atoms rearrange into molecules of 3 or 4 atoms (S3 and S4) which give the surface a reddish color. In time, the atoms rearrange into their most stable configuration (S8) that forms ordinary pale-yellow sulphur".
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Jupiter_from_New_Horizons-092606_1_hr.jpgJupiter, from New Horizons69 visiteBlazing along its path to Pluto, NASA's New Horizons has come within hailing distance of Jupiter. The first picture of the Giant Planet from the spacecraft's Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI), taken Sept. 4, 2006, is a tantalizing promise of what's to come when New Horizons flies through the Jupiter system early next year.
New Horizons was still 291 MKM (nearly 181 MMs) away from Jupiter when LORRI took the photo.
As New Horizons comes much closer, next January and February 2007, LORRI will take more-detailed images.
"These first LORRI images of Jupiter are awe-inspiring," says New Horizons Project Scientist Hal Weaver, of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), where LORRI was designed and built. "New Horizons is speeding toward this majestic planet at 45,000 miles per hour, right on target for a close encounter on February 28 of next year. LORRI's resolution at Jupiter will be 125 times better than now, and we're really looking forward to getting the most detailed views of the Jovian system since Cassini's flyby in late 2000 and Galileo's final images in 2003."
Now on the outskirts of the asteroid belt, LORRI snapped this image during a test sequence to help prepare for the Jupiter encounter observations. It was taken close to solar opposition, meaning that the Sun was almost directly behind the camera when it spied Jupiter. This makes Jupiter appear blindingly bright, about 40 times brighter than Pluto will be for LORRI's primary observations when New Horizons encounters the Pluto system in 2015. To avoid saturation, the camera's exposure time was kept to 6 milliseconds. This image was, in part, a test to see how well LORRI would operate with such a short exposure time.
"LORRI's first Jupiter image is all we could have expected," says LORRI Principal Investigator Andy Cheng, of APL. "We see belts, zones and large storms in Jupiter's atmosphere. We see the Jovian moons Io and Europa, as well as the shadows they cast on Jupiter. It is most gratifying to detect these moons against the glare from Jupiter."
LORRI wasn't the only New Horizons instrument peeking at Jupiter on Sept. 4; the Ralph imager also performed some important calibrations. "We rapidly scanned Ralph's Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera [MVIC] across Jupiter to test a technique we plan to employ near closest approach next February. We also observed Jupiter in the infrared using Ralph's Linear Etalon Imaging Spectral Array [LEISA]," says Ralph Program Manager Cathy Olkin, of the Southwest Research Institute. "Everything worked great."
New Horizons won't observe Jupiter again until early January 2007, when periodic monitoring will begin, followed by intensive observations at the end of February. The spacecraft will also continue to look at the Jovian magnetosphere for several months after closest approach.
"New Horizons is headed to a spectacular science encounter with the Jupiter system early next year," says mission Principal Investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute. "The first LORRI images of Jupiter just whet our appetite for the observations to come."
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Amalthea-PIA01076.jpgAmalthea and a few inner Moons of Jupiter68 visiteChe cosa distingue questi "macigni vaganti" dalla maggior parte delle Lune di Giove? Si tratta di Lune originarie del Sistema Gioviano o sono state "attratte" da Giove, durante un passaggio troppo ravvicinato? Probabilmente si tratta di asteroidi vaganti o di comete mancate: oggetti provenienti dalla Fascia di Kuiper (KBO) che, in transito accanto al Gigante Gassoso, si sono trovati all'angolo ed alla velocità corretti per non essere nè semplicemente deflessi dalla loro corsa e quindi scagliati via nello...
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Jupiter_s limb-Gal-PIA00896_modest.jpgJupiter's limb, from Galileo68 visiteCaption NASA originale:"North is at the top. The images are projected on a sphere, with features being foreshortened towards the north. The planetary limb runs along the right edge of the mosaic. Cloud patterns appear foreshortened as they approach the limb. The smallest resolved features are tens of kilometers in size. These images were taken on April 3, 1997, at a range of 1.4 MKM by the Solid State Imaging system (CCD) on NASA's Galileo spacecraft".
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Jupiter-Impact-2010-000.jpgImpact on Jupiter!68 visiteUn "Grazie di Cuore" a Lorenzo Leone ("Anakin") per aver citato l'informazione - preziosa e straordinaria, da innumerevoli punti di vista - che ora possiamo illustrare con immagini adeguate.
Un asteroide "grande quanto la Terra" o quasi, impatta Giove. "Grande quanto la Terra"? Onestamente ne dubitiamo (rectius: VOGLIAMO DUBITARNE!), per tantissimi motivi (sicurezza della Terra in primis ed efficienza del Sistema di Monitoraggio dei cosiddetti "Asteroidi Vicini" in secundis).
Ma una cosa è certa. O meglio, "sembra" certa: il Cielo sta cambiando.
Osserviamolo meglio! Osserviamolo TUTTI!MareKromium
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Jupiter-Impact-2010-007.jpgAnother Impact on Jupiter?68 visiteUn'altra immagine della "Fireball" che ha impattato Giove il giorno 20 Agosto u.s.
In questo caso si tratta di una ripresa effettuata dall'Astrofilo Giapponese Aoki Kazuo, da Tokio, il quale ha registrato un flash che, per coordinate spazio-temporali, coincide con quello rilevato e ripreso dall'altro Astrofilo del Sol Levante, Masayuki Tachikawa, che osservava il Gigante Gassoso dalla città di Kumamoto (la quale è distante circa 800 Km da Tokio).MareKromium
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Amalthea-PIA02532.jpgA white streak on Amalthea67 visite...spazio interstellare, nè per essere attratti ed ingurgitati definitivamente da Giove, come è invece accaduto alla Cometa Shoemaker-Levy. Molti Scienziati non escludono neppure l'ipotesi che possa trattarsi di frammenti di una Luna Gioviana disintegratasi (magari a seguito di una collisione) qualche milione di anni fa. La verità, come sempre, non sarà facile da trovarsi...
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