{"id":790995,"date":"2024-11-08T06:30:01","date_gmt":"2024-11-08T11:30:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?p=790995"},"modified":"2024-11-08T06:30:01","modified_gmt":"2024-11-08T11:30:01","slug":"jupiter-doesnt-have-a-surface-how-is-that-possible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?p=790995","title":{"rendered":"Jupiter doesn\u2019t have a surface. How is that possible?"},"content":{"rendered":"


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NASA\u2019s Juno spacecraft captured this image of Jupiter in 2020. How is it possible that Jupiter doesn\u2019t have a surface? Image via NASA\/ JPL-Caltech\/ SwRI\/ MSSS\/ David Marriott.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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  • Jupiter is a giant gas planet<\/strong> and the largest planet in our solar system.<\/li>\n
  • But Jupiter has no surface<\/strong>. It\u2019s made of gases that get increasingly dense as you head toward the center. Its interior is extremely inhospitable.<\/li>\n
  • If Jupiter didn\u2019t exist<\/strong>, life on Earth probably wouldn\u2019t exist either. That\u2019s because Jupiter protects us from incoming asteroids and comets.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    By Benjamin Roulston, Clarkson University<\/span><\/p>\n

    Jupiter doesn\u2019t have a surface. But how?<\/h3>\n

    The planet Jupiter has no solid ground or surface, like the grass or dirt you tread here on Earth. There\u2019s nothing to walk on, and no place to land a spaceship. But how can that be? If Jupiter doesn\u2019t have a surface, what does it have? How can it hold together?<\/p>\n

    Even as a professor of physics who studies all kinds of unusual phenomena, I realize the concept of a world without a surface is difficult to fathom. Yet much about Jupiter remains a mystery, even as NASA\u2019s robotic probe Juno begins its 9th year orbiting this strange planet. <\/p>\n

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