4
$\begingroup$

This is a comparison of a visible light image and a radio image of the area around Jupiter's great red spot from an article in Science News. The radio data is from the VLA, and the frequency is chosen to image Ammonia radio emission.

enter image description here

This is a radio image of both jupiter (smeared over 10 hours of observing) and its surrounding environment, colors represent radio wavelengths of 2cm (blue) 3cm (gold) and 6cm (red). Trapped charged particles in Jupiter's magnetic field produce very strong emission as well. Taken from an article in Gizmodo.

enter image description here

The Juno spacecraft will "scoot" under this emission so its antennae can see more clearly radio structure from the planet, reducing interference, but will only see a small area of the planet at a time.

During Juno's mission, will there be any simultaneous or near-simultaneous measurements of Jupiter from earth to complement data from Juno?

Additional source: Science

Improve this question
$\endgroup$
4
  • $\begingroup$ There are several spacecraft that can measure radio waves near Earth (e.g., http://www-lep.gsfc.nasa.gov/waves/) and these generally operate all the time, thus there will likely be "simultaneous" Earth-Jupiter radio measurements regardless of initial intent. Similar ideas would apply to energetic particle observations, which have been found to originate from Jupiter in some cases (e.g., http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1987ApJ...313..471M). $\endgroup$
    – honeste_vivere
    Jun 28, 2016 at 18:22
  • $\begingroup$ @honeste_vivere Interesting paper! This one has open access directly from the page you link to. I'm not sure how they can be certain that the variation in electrons has a period of 1.08 years rather than 1.00 years (Jovian synodic vs sidereal), using only 6.25 years of data - shown in Figure 5. Is this the only evidence that the origin is Jupiter not outside the solar system? $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Jun 28, 2016 at 22:09
  • $\begingroup$ No there have been a few other papers making similar arguments, but I was running low on characters. I am not entirely sold on the idea that they truly observed Jovian energetic particles, but I would need to look more closely at the datasets and all spacecraft locations (e.g., it's difficult to rule out the Earth and/or solar sources some times). $\endgroup$
    – honeste_vivere
    Jun 28, 2016 at 22:44
  • $\begingroup$ @honeste_vivere OK I'll do some more reading. It's a good point - jupiter is not only a visibly bright and radio-"loud" member of the solar system, but it has an influence on particle flux as well. Thanks! $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Jun 28, 2016 at 23:25

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
4
$\begingroup$

I've only been able to find one reference to joint observations thus far:

Juno produces five pole-to-pole latitudinal maps of microwave opacity as a function of altitude to depths greater than 100 bars (Figure 2). The independent swaths at different longitudes provide the ability to understand large scale features such as the Great Red Spot. The 0.1% precision of the radiometer allows us to measure small variations in radiance with respect to horizontal position and emission angle. With these measurements, we determine the global O/H and N/H ratios; we correlate the patterns of ammonia and water abundance below the clouds with the principal dynamical features at cloud-top level; we examine the deep roots of features like the Great Red Spot, the belts and zones, and potentially the 5- ?m hot spots. Context for these features is provided through coordinated Earth-based images and comparison with data from the E/PO imager, JunoCam.

-- The Juno Mission, S. J. Bolton and the Juno Science Team (emphasis added)

This pretty much amounts to a mission statement though. It is in a paper titled "The Juno Mission" put together by the Juno Science Team, and it says they will be providing context for Jupiter features with "coordinated Earth-based images". So it sounds like the answer to your question is a simple yes.

Improve this answer
$\endgroup$
2
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks for looking into this and finding (and reading) the Juno Mission paper! This one is a hard question - will they do X? so I appreciate you taking it on! This is going to be an exciting mission. $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Jun 14, 2016 at 14:32
  • $\begingroup$ @uhoh Yes, there are definitely joint observations ongoing. Now that we're in the thick of it, I'm not sure all that information is relevant to a forward-looking question. If someone else wants to do the work to present a useful summary, I'd happily upvote their answer. $\endgroup$
    – called2voyage ♦
    Aug 9, 2021 at 12:27

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge that you have read and understand our privacy policy and code of conduct.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.