Discover Jupiter's Mysteries with James Webb Space Telescope

[neilparker62]

TL;DR Summary

Jupiter as seen from James Webb

In case you didn't see it elsewhere:

 

[vanhees71]

Amazing! Is this "glowing light" on bottom and top (the poles I guess) aurorae?

 

[neilparker62]

Amazing! Is this "glowing light" on bottom and top (the poles I guess) aurorae?

Yes - apparently so.

https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/08/22/webbs-jupiter-images-showcase-auroras-hazes/

 

[berkeman]

Did anybody else spend over 5 minutes trying to explain to their spouse why the Great Red Spot is white in this JWST picture?

"But it's not red! Why would it be called the Great Red Spot?!"

 

[geordief]

Did anybody else spend over 5 minutes trying to explain to their spouse why the Great Red Spot is white in this JWST picture?

"But it's not red! Why would it be called the Great Red Spot?!"

No I gave that a mental swerve.

 

[sophiecentaur]

"But it's not red! Why would it be called the Great Red Spot?!"

That Hubble Pallet can be an embarrassment at the same time as it's false colour reveals interesting features to 'experts'. I wonder if that's the problem.

 

[sophiecentaur]

Did anybody else spend over 5 minutes trying to explain to their spouse why the Great Red Spot is white in this JWST picture?

"But it's not red! Why would it be called the Great Red Spot?!"

Our Sun is classed as a Green Star; similar problem. The spectrum peaks in the greens but we call it White. It's all in the eye of the beholder.

 

[pinball1970]

Our Sun is classed as a Green Star; similar problem. The spectrum peaks in the greens but we call it White. It's all in the eye of the beholder.

Or just shifting the colour right with Webb. The shortest wavelength being blue and longest red.
Shortest being 700nm plus.
What is there and what a human is able to detect and what these instruments illustrate is something that has been a real education for me.
How does a telescope work and how do we get the images?

 

[Vanadium 50]

Our Sun is classed as a Green Star

By whom?

It does produce green energy, but I think that's something else.

 

[phyzguy]

All the wavelengths in this picture are in the infrared and far outside our visible range. If you plotted this picture using "real" colors, it would be black.

 

[sophiecentaur]

By whom?

You have a point there. There is a reference to the idea in a Wiki article that talks about the history of stellar classification. I'm being a bit sloppy about this but I'm basically saying that the perceived colour of a star is not a good form of classification because colour is completely subjective. Our colour vision attempts to make all illuminants appear as white and to give a consistent assessment of the colour of objects under a range of illuminants (fluorescent lamps completely defeat our colour sense)

With a spectrometer we can identify the peak spectral level of a star. The Sun peaks around the green (subjective) wavelengths. Early attempts at consistent classification tried to use the spectral peak of stars (something they could do with simple equipment, I guess.). If you were to try to normalise all the spectra to a reference 'perfect / flat' white then the Sun would be greenISH.

Snag. Stars of different generations will have been formed of different constituent elements with different spectra from that our our Sun so they don't just have black body colours. Colours are distorted from the [normal Edit expected] curve and their spectral maxima don't just follow the temperature in any case.

A member of my Astro Soc gets uncontrollably excited about coloured stars and I've been (slightly) affected in the same way, recently.

 

[Mark44]

That Hubble Pallet

Pallet -- a structure that is used to hold a heavy piece of equipment or building supplies. Pallets are often made of wood.
Palette - a selection of colors.
Palate - the roof of the mouth or the sense of taste.

 

[Vanadium 50]

If we're going to quibble, can I call it the Great infraRed Spot?

 

[gmax137]

Maybe the "venti" or even "trenta" IR spot? how many Starbucks do you figure are on the perimeter of the spot?

 

[sophiecentaur]

Pallet -- a structure that is used to hold a heavy piece of equipment or building supplies. Pallets are often made of wood.
Palette - a selection of colors.
Palate - the roof of the mouth or the sense of taste.

I may be able to put it all down to the automatic spell "correction". On balance, the app would have assumed that carrying things is more common than painting them. Embarrassing, nonetheless.

 

[sophiecentaur]

What is there and what a human is able to detect and what these instruments illustrate is something that has been a real education for me.

There is virtually nothing in the night sky (with the exception of the Moon) which we can see 'in colour' because our cone colour sensors are just not sensitive enough. We 'see' in almost monochrome, with just hints of colour in the most obvious objects. All those glamorous nebulae that we see in so many images on the net are the result of very long exposures on sensitive sensors, so it's all pretty artificial. Even the very bright nebula in Orion (stunning in its own way) appears as a bright fuzzy but colourless patch through my 10" reflector (a serious light bucket by amateur standards).

OTOH, photos of Northern Lights on our smart phones can be less stunning than the visual experience that people can get when they're actually there. I guess it must be to do with context and psychology.