New Juno results suggest that the violent thunderstorms taking place in Jupiter’s atmosphere may form ammonia-rich hail, or ‘mushballs’, that play a key role in the planet’s atmospheric dynamics. This theory, developed using data from Juno’s microwave radiometer by the Juno team, ... led by a researcher at the Laboratoire Lagrange ... The theory sheds light on some puzzling aspects of the meteorology of Jupiter and has implications for how giant planet atmospheres work in general. ...
In the first article, researchers from the US and the Laboratoire Lagrange suggest that when these crystals interact with gaseous ammonia, the ammonia acts as an anti-freeze, changing the ice to a liquid. ...
Measurements by Juno discovered that while ammonia is abundant near Jupiter’s equator, it is highly variable and generally depleted elsewhere to very deep pressures. ... To explain Juno’s discovery of ammonia’s deep variability across most of Jupiter, the researchers developed an atmospheric mixing model that is presented in a second article. ...
In a third article, the researchers report observations of Jovian lightning flashes by one of Juno’s cameras. The small flashes appear as bright spots on the cloud tops, with sizes proportional to their depth in Jupiter’s atmosphere. ...
'Shallow Lightning' and 'Mushballs' Reveal Ammonia to Juno Scientists NASA | JPL-Caltech | SwRI | Juno | 2020 Aug 05
Storms and the Depletion of Ammonia in Jupiter: I. Microphysics of 'Mushballs' ~ Tristan Guillot et al
Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets 125(8):403 (Aug 2020) DOI: 10.1029/2020JE006403
Storms and the Depletion of Ammonia in Jupiter: II. Explaining the Juno Observations ~ Tristan Guillot et al
Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets 125(8):404 (Aug 2020) DOI: 10.1029/2020JE006404
Small Lightning Flashes Indicating Shallow Electrical Storms ~ Heidi N. Becker et al
Last edited by bystander on Wed Aug 05, 2020 8:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason:Added NASA/JPL/SwRI Juno article links
Know the quiet place within your heart and touch the rainbow of possibility; be
alive to the gentle breeze of communication, and please stop being such a jerk. — Garrison Keillor
<<During life activities such as cellular respiration, several chemical reactions take place in the body. These are known as metabolism. These chemical reactions produce waste products such as carbon dioxide, water, salts, urea and uric acid. Accumulation of these wastes beyond a level inside the body is harmful to the body. The excretory organs remove these wastes. This process of removal of metabolic waste from the body is known as excretion.
In animals, the main excretory products are carbon dioxide, ammonia (in ammoniotelics), urea (in ureotelics), uric acid (in uricotelics), guanine (in Arachnida) and creatine. The liver and kidneys clear many substances from the blood (for example, in renal excretion), and the cleared substances are then excreted from the body in the urine and feces.
Aquatic animals usually excrete ammonia directly into the external environment, as this compound has high solubility and there is ample water available for dilution. In terrestrial animals ammonia-like compounds are converted into other nitrogenous materials as there is less water in the environment and ammonia itself is toxic. Birds excrete their nitrogenous wastes as uric acid in the form of a paste. Although this process is metabolically more expensive, it allows more efficient water retention and it can be stored more easily in the egg. Many avian species, especially seabirds, can also excrete salt via specialized nasal salt glands, the saline solution leaving through nostrils in the beak.>>
