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Jupiter
Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system. In Roman mythology, Jupiter was
king of the gods. The Romans borrowed much of Greek mythology, and often changed
the Greek names into Latin. The planet Jupiter was actually named for the ruler of
Olympus in Greece, the mythological Zeus.
Even though this giant planet is 370 million miles away, it often shines brightly.
Its globular shape is somewhat flattened in the polar regions because of rapid rotation,
once in about ten hours. NASA photographs of Jupiter show brightly colored bands
ranging from orange to brown to white. A large Red Spot indicates a disturbance in the
atmosphere, which was seen as early as 1631 in scientific drawings and is apparently a
partially permanent feature of the huge planet. This Red Spot is cooler than the areas that
look orange and brown. It rotates in an east to west direction once every six days. Small
almost oval white spots rotate counterclockwise also.
White bands are cooler and less deep than those that appear orange or brown.
Jupiter’s outer layers are gaseous and are composed of mainly hydrogen and helium. The
depth of the atmosphere remains unknown. The surface is cold (about –130 degrees C)
and inside the planet there is great pressure with high temperatures. The atmosphere
appears to have features that are scattered evenly- clouds, currents, and atmospheric
disturbances. Winds in the northern part move from east to west, and those in the
southern part move from west to east.
Jupiter has a ring, possibly more than one, that was determined by pictures taken from
Voyager 2 in 1979. It has fourteen satellites and four of them can be seen with the aid of
a telescope. The moons viewed by means of a telescope are Io, Europa (about the size of
earth’s moon), Ganymede and Callisto. Some scientists think that these four moons
might be called planets because of new information about their geological makeup.
Jupiter may be seen in the area of a given constellation for more than a year, and it often
appears brighter than nearby stars.
1. The largest planet in our solar system is
__________________________________.
2. The three evenly scattered features on the planet are ______________,
________________, and ________________________.
3. The outer layers of the atmosphere are __________________________.
4. Two chemical elements found in the outer layers are _____________ and
___________________.
5. Jupiter has fourteen _____________________. Some of their names are
___________________, ___________________, ______________________, and
_________________________.
6. The basic colors of Jupiter are ______________, ____________________,
______________________, and _______________________.
7. The large Red Spot rotates in an __________ to _________ direction.
8. _________ __________ are cooler and less deep than the ones that appear orange
or brown.
9. Jupiter rotates on its axis once every ___________ hours.