Jupiter’s poles blanketed with cyclone clusters

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Jupiter’s poles are blanketed by geometric clusters of cyclones and its atmosphere is deeper than scientists suspected.

These are just some of the discoveries reported by four international research teams Wednesday, based on observations by NASA’S Juno spacecraft circling Jupiter.

One group uncovered a constellation of nine cyclones over Jupiter’s north pole and six over the south pole. The wind speeds exceed Category 5 hurricane strength in places, reaching 220 mph.

The massive storms haven’t changed position much — or merged — since observations began.

Team leader Alberto Adriani of Italy’s National Institute for Astrophysics in Rome was surprised to find such complex structures. Scientists thought they’d find something similar to the six-sided cloud system spinning over Saturn’s north pole.

“We were wrong about it,” he said via email.

Instead, they found an octagon-shaped grouping over the north pole, with eight cyclones surrounding one in the middle, and a pentagon-shaped batch over the south pole. Each cyclone measures several thousand miles across.

The fifth planet from our sun, gas giant Jupiter is by far the largest planet in our solar system. Launched in 2011, Juno has been orbiting Jupiter since 2016 and peering beneath the thick ammonia clouds. It’s only the second spacecraft to circle the planet; Galileo did it from 1995 to 2003.

Another of the studies in this week’s journal Nature finds that Jupiter’s crisscrossing east-west jet streams actually penetrate thousands of miles beneath the visible cloud tops.