The weather on Neptune, the eighth planet from the sun, is an enigma to begin with. And while the observations, presented in Madison at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division of Planetary Science, are helping scientists tease out clues to the planet’s stormy weather, they also are deepening some of Neptune’s mysteries, said Sromovsky. Sromovsky of UW–Madison has captured the most insightful images to date of a planet whose blustery weather – monster storms and equatorial winds of 900 miles per hour – bewilders scientists.īlending a series of Hubble images, Sromovsky’s team constructed a time-lapse rotation movie of Neptune, permitting scientists to watch the ebb and flow of the distant planet’s weather. Using powerful ground- and space-based telescopes, scientists have obtained a moving look at some of the wildest, weirdest weather in the solar system.Ĭombining simultaneous observations of Neptune made with the Hubble Space Telescope and NASA’s Infrared Telescope Facility on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, a team of scientists led by Lawrence A. ![]() Whether these differences reflect long-term changes or short term weather fluctuations is not known at this time. This comparison shows greatly increased cloud activity in 1998. The 1998 sesquence is then compared to an imaging done in 1996. The dark blue band in the middle of both images is just south of Neptune’s equator where wind speeds reach almost 900 mph, blowing opposite to the eastward rotation of the planet. ![]() High and dense clouds appear white, while the very high and thin clouds tend to be yellow-red. In these composite color images, as in true color images, the predominant blue color comes from the absorption of red and infrared light by methane gas. The first sequence of this QucikTime movie (8 Mb) shows most of one 16.11-hour Neptune rotation on August 11, 1998. The top images were taken this year and help illustrate the dynamic weather features that dominate the planet. The bottom images show Neptune’s Hubble portrait circa 1996. How, precisely, Neptune’s weather is driven is a mystery since the sun, which drives the Earth’s weather, is 900 times dimmer there than on Earth. ![]() On Neptune, winds blow at 900 miles per hour and huge storms - some the size of Earth itself - come and go with regularity. These views of Neptune, as seen through the Hubble Space Telescope, are helping planetary scientists gain some insight into the weird and wild weather that is a hallmark of the eighth planet from the sun.
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