APOD: Jupiter and the Moon's Shadowed Horizon (2004 Dec 09)

[WayBeyondSoccerMom]

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap041209.html

Today's APOD picture of Jupiter and the Moon reminded me of a recent conversation with my son.

My son asked me the following questions, and I don't know how to answer him.

Since Jupiter is a gas giant planet, does that mean that I could fire a bullet through the planet?

Could I fly a spaceship through the planet, if it is just made of gas?

If we had the technology, is there a place where I could stand, on Jupiter's surface?

Help.

[S. Bilderback]

Jupiter is a gas giant and does have a rocky core much smaller than the Earth; I think standing on it would be out of the question. The pull of Jupiter’s gravity is 26 times stronger than the Earth so I he weighed 100 pounds on Earth he would weigh 2,600 pounds on Jupiter, I sure he's a strong young man but probably not that strong. Then there is the heat and the atmospheric pressure, we can only give our best guess of the temps at the rocky core somewhere in the 1,000 degree range with pressures thousands of times stronger than the pressures at the deepest parts of the ocean. The gasses are compressed so hard and are so hot a bullet would quickly slow, melt and slowly fall until all it's atoms would defuse and mix into the atmosphere and may take millions of years for the atoms to finally reach the core if at all.
I hope that's enough but not too much information.

[WayBeyondSoccerMom]

Thanks so much for the information. I always hear about the "gas giant" part of Jupiter but not so much on the "rocky core smaller than Earth" part.

I will be sure to share the news with him today.

[HomeAl0ne]

The extreme pressure and temperature inside Jupiter leads to exotic chemistry. The inner layers of hydrogen in Jupiter's atmosphere, under the pressure of the atmosphere above, may have formed into a layer of what is called liquid metallic hydrogen. Some scientists theorize that beneath this layer there is no solid mass at the center of Jupiter, but that the unique temperature and pressure conditions sustain a core whose density is more like liquid or slush.

see http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/jupiter/core.html

[S. Bilderback]

You are right about the metalic hydrogen, but that's the inner most part of the atmosphere, but there is a small core and the if it is not a rocky mix it would have to be a molten core of heavy elements. But once again it's all opinions based on best guesses. I also didn't want to give too much information.

[DIARREA]

i remember that once i read that over the metallic hydrogen (wich conducts electricity) there is a liquid hydrogen sea, where it rains hydrogen ( a really cool visage at all) and it would look like this


under the metallic hydrogen there is a rocky core
i have heard that the same rocky core would be present at saturn and at least neptune
do u guys have any other nice pics of what would look like inside a gas giant? thats something that makes me wonder heheheheeh
i would love that the probe that galileo sent to jupiter would have a camera but it didnt

would u imagine....that in some centures we could develope a probe that could survive that conditions in the jupiter's core? and beam images back of rainig hydrogen?
hehehehe dreaming is free

[Guest]

Arthur C. Clark launched the idea that Jupiter’s core, because of the incredible pressure found, could be a gigantic diamond, about the size of the earth.

Pretty cool, uh?

[crosscountry]

I think if you could get close enought to Jupiter you could use an air balloon to ride the clouds.

but the radiation is so strong no human can survive the trip. (as of now anyway)

I'd rather walk around on Callisto or Europa. Io would be out of the question.

[Boldra]

According to a U of Berkeley study, it may actually rain diamonds on Uranus and Neptune http://www.scjai.com/technote43.html .

Two thoughts occur with regard to this: firstly, wouldn't it be more like snow than diamonds? And secondly, if the light gets through, you're gonna get some pretty spectacular rainbows!

As for visualizing other worlds, a brilliant site is David Szondy's "Tales of Future Past": http://www.davidszondy.com/future/otherworlds/life.htm. Jupiter is here: http://www.davidszondy.com/future/other ... upiter.htm
. The pictures and the content of the site is all from old magazines (old enough to be out of copyright?), so the ideas are pre-voyager and pre-Galileo (the probe not the man). If anyone knows of a site with a comparable collection of modern pictures I'd be very interested. Despite it's age, Szondy's site is truly excellent.

Boldra

[DIARREA]

HAhahahahahHAHAHA EXELLENT MAN!
JUST LOOK AT SATURN'S SURFACE HAhahaahHAHAHAHAhahahahaHAHAHAH

[Boldra]

Oh wow! It even has the rainbow I was talking about! Except that the rainbows are supposed to be on Uranus or Neptune and not Saturn...

Boldra

[David]

No witn a capital N.

[S. Bilderback]

Here I am surfing on Titan,. Howdy



[/url]

[Orca]

The pull of Jupiter’s gravity is 26 times stronger than the Earth so I he weighed 100 pounds on Earth he would weigh 2,600 pounds on Jupiter,

Bilderback, that is actually a bit high. The gravity of Jupiter is 2.34 times that of the Earth. A kid that weighs 100 lbs on Earth would weigh 234 lbs on the "surface" of Jupiter.

Surface gravity: 2.34 (Earth = 1)

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/solar_system/pl ... index.html



By the way did you happen to hook up with that girl on the beach on Titan?

8)

[S. Bilderback]

That number suprises me, with a mass over 300 times that of Earth I would expect it to be higher. The size of the core must have been down graded since my old books were published.

That girl is just a surfing friend of mine - she did ask if you were married.

[crosscountry]

That number suprises me, with a mass over 300 times that of Earth I would expect it to be higher. The size of the core must have been down graded since my old books were published.

That girl is just a surfing friend of mine - she did ask if you were married.

a=(m*G)/(R^2)

Jupiter is not dense, so it has a larger volume per kilogram than the earth. At the distance of it's radius it's gravity is not so great. 1/(R^2) rule works every time.

think about the sun and a black hole. there are solar mass black holes, but they are the size of a city not our sun. it's all about density when you're on the surface.

[sava]

Could you stand on Jupiter for 3 minutes without getting killed by...
-asteroids
-volcanoes
-freezing to death???



-Sava

[sava]

Anyone???
-Sava

[rstevenson]

Could you stand on Jupiter for 3 minutes without getting killed by...
-asteroids
-volcanoes
-freezing to death???

IF you could stand on Jupiter for three minutes, the answers would be ...

Yes.
Yes.
Yes (if you had a good space suit on.)

BUT you really couldn't stand there at all. What we see as Jupiter is just the surface of its immense atmosphere, so trying to stand on that visible surface would be like trying to stand on top of Earth's clouds -- with a similar result. And if you decided to go down to the solid surface far, far below the clouds, you'd boil, bake and dissolve long before you got to it. Other than that it would be a nice place to visit.

Rob

[orin stepanek]

December 9; 2004 picture of the day.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap041209.html

Click to view full size image