WEBVTT FILE 1 00:00:00.010 --> 00:00:04.190 2 00:00:04.190 --> 00:00:10.250 3 00:00:10.250 --> 00:00:12.240 Now is a very good time. 4 00:00:12.240 --> 00:00:16.420 tonight or any time in April to go out and look out up at 5 00:00:16.420 --> 00:00:20.610 Jupiter, it's going to be very bright in the night sky. 6 00:00:20.610 --> 00:00:24.620 And so easy to see with the naked eye and even better if you have 7 00:00:24.620 --> 00:00:28.810 binoculars or a small telescope, you can see it well and you can see even 8 00:00:28.810 --> 00:00:36.840 some of it's tiny moons if you're in a clear, dark,place. 9 00:00:36.840 --> 00:00:40.860 10 00:00:40.860 --> 00:00:45.060 So we've taken advantage of the fact that Jupiter is relatively close to 11 00:00:45.060 --> 00:00:49.250 snap a new picture of Jupiter with the Hubble Space Telescope. 12 00:00:49.250 --> 00:00:53.300 And with Hubble we can see all this gorgeous detail, the atmospheric 13 00:00:53.300 --> 00:00:57.310 bands, the different colors representing sometimes different 14 00:00:57.310 --> 00:01:01.330 altitudes of the clouds. The great red spot, 15 00:01:01.330 --> 00:01:05.530 which we know is a giant hurricane, we're taking this image and 16 00:01:05.530 --> 00:01:09.550 putting it into context of several other images that we've taken over 17 00:01:09.550 --> 00:01:13.560 the last couple of decades with the Hubble Telescope, and that's giving 18 00:01:13.560 --> 00:01:17.650 us this time picture of how Jupiter is changing 19 00:01:17.650 --> 00:01:21.840 it's atmospheric dynamic's change. We're able 20 00:01:21.840 --> 00:01:25.940 to see things like wave structure in the 21 00:01:25.940 --> 00:01:29.960 atmospheric clouds, we've used Hubble's ultraviolet 22 00:01:29.960 --> 00:01:33.960 capabilities to look also over the years at the aurora 23 00:01:33.960 --> 00:01:38.140 the northern lights, to see how it changes in response to 24 00:01:38.140 --> 00:01:42.150 the magnetic field around Jupiter. So the new image will fit into this 25 00:01:42.150 --> 00:01:46.170 repeated paradigm of looking at 26 00:01:46.170 --> 00:01:50.190 Jupiter, and we'll continue to look at Jupiter and the outer gas giant planets 27 00:01:50.190 --> 00:01:54.220 in our solar system with Hubble in future years as well, to learn how things 28 00:01:54.220 --> 00:01:58.230 change over time on this very dynamic planet. 29 00:01:58.230 --> 00:02:02.410 30 00:02:02.410 --> 00:02:06.420 31 00:02:06.420 --> 00:02:10.440 This "Red Spot" has been observed for well over 32 00:02:10.440 --> 00:02:14.440 a hundred years, but we've noticed over the last couple of decades, especially 33 00:02:14.440 --> 00:02:18.460 looking with Hubble, that it is changing it is 34 00:02:18.460 --> 00:02:22.490 shrinking in size, it's becoming more rounded and less oval 35 00:02:22.490 --> 00:02:26.500 in shape, changes in color. So this hurricane is 36 00:02:26.500 --> 00:02:30.510 changing, perhaps decreasing in some ways 37 00:02:30.510 --> 00:02:34.520 and other little hurricanes are cropping up. We have something we call "Red Spot 38 00:02:34.520 --> 00:02:38.530 Jupiter" I'm sorry, "Red Spot Junior" that we've seen over the last decade 39 00:02:38.530 --> 00:02:42.540 with Hubble and some little white spot, little other storms that 40 00:02:42.540 --> 00:02:46.550 cropping up as well. So Jupiter has a lot of atmospheric 41 00:02:46.550 --> 00:02:50.560 weather dynamics, if you will, going on. We don't know exactly why 42 00:02:50.560 --> 00:02:54.570 these changes take place because Jupiter is such a different planet from 43 00:02:54.570 --> 00:02:58.600 Earth, it's enormous, you could fit a thousand Earths 44 00:02:58.600 --> 00:03:02.610 within Jupiter and it doesn't have a solid surface 45 00:03:02.610 --> 00:03:06.790 it has, this cloudy covering 46 00:03:06.790 --> 00:03:10.810 it's mostly made of gas and liquid, so there's no solid 47 00:03:10.810 --> 00:03:14.990 continents to slow down hurricanes like we have on Earth so we don't- we're not quite sure 48 00:03:14.990 --> 00:03:19.180 why these dynamics happen but we are certainly trying to know more 49 00:03:19.180 --> 00:03:23.190 by doing these observations. We even have an probe 50 00:03:23.190 --> 00:03:27.220 an orbiting satellite at Jupiter called Juno 51 00:03:27.220 --> 00:03:31.230 that's sending more detailed information 52 00:03:31.230 --> 00:03:35.400 studying it's magnetic field, it's gravitational field so that combined with 53 00:03:35.400 --> 00:03:39.420 these full planet images that we get from Hubble, are giving us the information 54 00:03:39.420 --> 00:03:43.600 we need to understand it better. 55 00:03:43.600 --> 00:03:47.640 56 00:03:47.640 --> 00:03:51.830 Well the moons of Jupiter are fascinating. There are well 57 00:03:51.830 --> 00:03:55.840 over 50 of them but the inner-most moons are particularly 58 00:03:55.840 --> 00:03:59.910 interesting, these are the ones that Galileo saw over 400 years ago 59 00:03:59.910 --> 00:04:04.100 but we're interested in particular in Europa this is a cold 60 00:04:04.100 --> 00:04:08.140 ice covered moon, but we believe that under that icy crust 61 00:04:08.140 --> 00:04:12.150 there's a liquid water ocean and of course where there's water we're always 62 00:04:12.150 --> 00:04:16.160 curious to know if there could be habitability for life or 63 00:04:16.160 --> 00:04:20.340 even life itself, but it's hard to study that water under the icy 64 00:04:20.340 --> 00:04:24.350 crust, however recent observations with the Hubble Space Telescope 65 00:04:24.350 --> 00:04:28.530 have shown us potential plumes of water vapor 66 00:04:28.530 --> 00:04:32.540 being ejected off the surface of this moon 67 00:04:32.540 --> 00:04:36.740 perhaps between the cracks in the ice. These water 68 00:04:36.740 --> 00:04:40.780 vapor plumes could be potentially sampled to study the nature 69 00:04:40.780 --> 00:04:44.790 of that water by looking at it from outside the icy crust without having 70 00:04:44.790 --> 00:04:48.790 at least intially to drill down through the ice to try to study that water 71 00:04:48.790 --> 00:04:52.800 so it's very exciting time for us right now studying 72 00:04:52.800 --> 00:04:56.990 Jupiter and it's moon Europa in particular. 73 00:04:56.990 --> 00:05:01.180 74 00:05:01.180 --> 00:05:05.190 The Hubble Space Telescope is about to 75 00:05:05.190 --> 00:05:09.210 mark it's 27th birthday, so we're very happy 76 00:05:09.210 --> 00:05:13.210 about that. What we're really happy about is that Hubble is working 77 00:05:13.210 --> 00:05:17.410 very well, because throughout these decades we've had several 78 00:05:17.410 --> 00:05:21.420 astronaut servicing missions to Hubble that have put in new 79 00:05:21.420 --> 00:05:25.440 and improved cameras and interesting and have replaced batteries and 80 00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:29.620 gyroscopes, so the telescope is in terrific shape. In fact it's more 81 00:05:29.620 --> 00:05:33.630 scientifically powerful now than ever before if you can believe that 82 00:05:33.630 --> 00:05:37.640 so it's in wonderful shape and we think that it will continue 83 00:05:37.640 --> 00:05:41.640 to bring us terrific scientific data well into the 84 00:05:41.640 --> 00:05:45.810 2020s which means it will overlap with the James Webb Space Telescope 85 00:05:45.810 --> 00:05:49.820 which will launch next year. We're very excited about the 86 00:05:49.820 --> 00:05:53.840 Webb Telescope as well because it will be an infrared observatory 87 00:05:53.840 --> 00:05:57.850 it will provide us information that is different from what Hubble 88 00:05:57.850 --> 00:06:01.860 can provide and complements what Hubble provides 89 00:06:01.860 --> 00:06:05.880 so both of these observatories operating at the same time 90 00:06:05.880 --> 00:06:10.060 perhaps for several years, we'll have information from optical 91 00:06:10.060 --> 00:06:14.080 visible wave lengths of light into the ultraviolet that Hubble can see 92 00:06:14.080 --> 00:06:18.090 and into the infrared wavelengths of light that the James Webb 93 00:06:18.090 --> 00:06:22.110 Space Telescope can see, and that gives us a much richer 94 00:06:22.110 --> 00:06:26.120 swath of information, but about planets like Jupiter and others 95 00:06:26.120 --> 00:06:30.310 in our solar system, but also about very distant 96 00:06:30.310 --> 00:06:34.310 galaxies as well, so we're excited about these capabilities 97 00:06:34.310 --> 00:06:38.510 and the other space telescopes and telescopes on the ground that work together 98 00:06:38.510 --> 00:06:42.520 as well to give us this full symphony of information about 99 00:06:42.520 --> 00:06:44.955 the universe we live in.