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NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day

🌌 NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day

Jupiter: At The Belt-Zone Boundary Credit:

Date: 1997-03-10

Jupiter: At The Belt-Zone Boundary

Credit:

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Explanation:

Jupiter's thick atmosphere is striped by wind-driven cloud bands that remain fixed in latitude - dark colored bands are known as belts while light colored bands are zones. At Jupiter's belt-zone boundaries the shearing wind velocities can reach nearly 300 miles per hour. Near infrared images recently returned by the Galileo Spacecraft were mapped to visible colors in this close-up of a belt-zone boundary near the gas giant's equator. The color mapping reveals different layers, lower clouds are bluish, higher ones pinkish. The smallest features seen are tens of miles across.