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Chandra Probes High-Voltage Auroras on Jupiter
Steve Roy
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
(Phone: 256.544.0034)
Photo release: 05-025

Chandra probes high-voltage auroras on Jupiter. + Large (2987 x 1454, 300 ppi)
+ Medium (720 x 350, 72 ppi)
+ Small (100 x 75, 72 ppi)

Jupiter shows intense X-ray emission associated with auroras in its polar regions, in the image taken by the Chandra X-ray Observatory at left. Extended monitoring by Chandra showed that the auroral X-rays are caused by highly charged particles crashing into the atmosphere above Jupiter’s poles.

The charged particles were primarily ions of oxygen and other elements that were stripped of most of their electrons, which implies that the ions were accelerated to high energies in a multimillion-volt environment above the planet’s poles. Such high voltages indicate that the cause of many of Jupiter’s auroras is different from auroras produced on Earth or Saturn.

The accompanying schematic illustrates how Jupiter’s unusually frequent and spectacular auroral activity is produced. Jupiter’s strong, rapidly rotating magnetic field, indicated by the light-blue lines, generates strong electric fields in the space around the planet. Particles, appearing as white dots, from Jupiter’s volcanically active moon, Io, drift outward to create a huge reservoir of electrons and ions. These charged particles, trapped in Jupiter’s magnetic field, are continually being accelerated, appearing as gold particles, down into the atmosphere above the polar regions, so auroras are almost always active on Jupiter.

Electric voltages of about 10 million volts, and currents of 10 million amps -- a hundred-times greater than the most powerful lightning bolts -- are required to explain the auroras, which are a thousand-times more powerful than those on Earth.


NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program. (Credit: NASA/CXC/MSFC/R. Elsner et al.)

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+ Chandra Fact Sheet