A professor at Northumbria University in the north-east of England has been given telescope time by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) later this year to study Jupiter’s atmosphere, also known as the ionosphere. Being awarded such a JWST award is highly competitive which makes getting the opportunity to use its powerful instruments to study space an extremely high honor.
Dr. Tom Stallard, who is a professor in the Department of Mathematics, Physics and Electrical Engineering at Northumbria University, is the only scientist who will be given the opportunity to use JWST in 2023 to observe the planets within our solar system, which will start on September 7. He hopes using the most powerful telescope ever built to determine how Jupiter’s ionosphere interacts with the celestial body and Jupiter’s atmosphere below.
“Even though Jupiter looks very different from Earth there is a lot we can learn about our planet by studying Jupiter,” said Dr. Stallard. “The processes are very similar, but Jupiter’s magnetic field is very strong, and unusual. The time available on the James Webb Space Telescope is rare – and the time to study the planets inside our planet is rare, so to be given this opportunity is very exciting. “
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Dr. Stallard was granted access to JWST through the Space Telescope Science Institute’s General Observer (GO) program, which is distributed among observatories and allows scientists and astronomers to register the telescope’s time with JWST. The GO program is planned to include a longer period of JWST observations, with Cycle 1 running from July 2022 to July 2023 and Cycle 2 beginning soon after.
The opinion of Dr. Stallard, “Revealing the atmosphere of Jupiter and preventing the loss of space from the Giant Planets”, was selected for the JWST Cycle 2 GO Program, with a full list of approved proposals currently available. In the research of Dr. Stallard, his team will use JWST to observe 36 of the fringes of Jupiter’s atmosphere, also known as branches, with 19 of these events occurring in Jupiter’s dawn and the rest occurring in Jupiter’s dusk.
Dr. Stallard is using JWST at a time when NASA’s Juno spacecraft, which is currently orbiting Jupiter, will be on the other side of the planet and pointing at Earth. With JWST located at the Earth-Moon L2 Lagrange Point on the other side of the Earth’s Moon and pointing to Jupiter, this means that Dr. Stallard will have the rare opportunity to examine images taken from all sides of Jupiter at the same time. The goal of these observations will be to better understand the decay of Jupiter’s atmosphere into space. Along with this, scientists can also gain a better understanding of the formation and evolution of exoplanets, since Jupiter is used as an analog for studying atmospheric exoplanets.
“Getting access to the James Webb Space Telescope is a very competitive process and is a testament to the quality and timing of the research that Professor Stallard does,” said Dr. Louise Bracken, who is Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research and Knowledge Exchange). at Northumbria University. “This award highlights and enhances the existing work of our Solar and Space Physics researchers at Northumbria University and strengthens the North East’s reputation as a center of excellence in this field.”
Although this opportunity is the first time that Dr. Stallard has been using JWST to look at Jupiter, this will not be the first time that JWST has seen the world’s largest planet, as the powerful telescope used its Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) to capture spectacular images of Jupiter in August 2022, including Earth’s rings, the auroras, are one of the brightest moons, Amalthea.
What new information have scientists gained about Jupiter and its ionosphere from these observations? Only time will tell, and that’s why we science!
As always, keep doing science & keep looking!
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