Jupiter Photographed With Its Rings and Aurora

After more than 10 years of delay, the James Webb Space Telescope was finally sent to the region where it would end its life last December. The telescope shared the first color deep space photos it obtained in the past weeks. While the observations with James Webb continued, the new images shared today belonged to Jupiter, the largest planet of the Solar System.

Images obtained by the European Space Agency using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope revealed Jupiter’s invisible ring and aurora at the planet’s poles. The resulting spectacular images were as follows:

Jupiter as seen by James Webb:

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The images you see above were taken with the Telescope’s NIRCam equipment, which includes three special infrared filters. Since infrared light is not visible to the naked eye, the images obtained by the telescope were then processed into the visible color spectrum.

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In the image of Jupiter alone, which was created from the combination of several images taken from Webb, the auroral lights extend to the high altitudes above both the north and south poles of Jupiter. The auroral lights shine in a filter matched with redder colors that also accentuate the light reflected from the lower clouds and upper haze. A different filter, paired with yellows and greens, shows hazes swirling at the north and south poles. A third filter paired with blues shows light reflecting off a deeper main cloud.

Jupiter’s notorious Great Red Spot, a storm large enough to swallow Earth, appears as white in these images as the other clouds. Because these dots and clouds reflect too much sunlight to the telescope.

James Webb recently re-imaged Jupiter: