Abstract
In the first 20 orbits of the Juno spacecraft around Jupiter, we have identified a variety of wave‐like features in images made by its public‐outreach camera, JunoCam. Because of Juno's unprecedented and repeated proximity to Jupiter's cloud tops during its close approaches, JunoCam has detected more wave structures than any previous surveys. Most of the waves appear in long wave packets, oriented east‐west and populated by narrow wave crests. Spacing between crests were measured as small as ~30 km, shorter than any previously measured. Some waves are associated with atmospheric features, but others are not ostensibly associated with any visible cloud phenomena and thus may be generated by dynamical forcing below the visible cloud tops. Some waves also appear to be converging, and others appear to be overlapping, possibly at different atmospheric levels. Another type of wave has a series of fronts that appear to be radiating outward from the center of a cyclone. Most of these waves appear within 5° of latitude from the equator, but we have detected waves covering planetocentric latitudes between 20°S and 45°N. The great majority of the waves appear in regions associated with prograde motions of the mean zonal flow. Juno was unable to measure the velocity of wave features to diagnose the wave types due to its close and rapid flybys. However, both by our own upper limits on wave motions and by analogy with previous measurements, we expect that the waves JunoCam detected near the equator are inertia‐gravity waves.
Highlights
The Juno mission's JunoCam instrument (Hansen et al, 2017), conceived as a public‐outreach camera, has provided a surprising wealth of scientific results
In the first 20 orbits of the Juno spacecraft around Jupiter, we have identified a variety of wave‐like features in images made by its public‐outreach camera, JunoCam
Similar to Voyager, all the waves detected in JunoCam images in regions of retrograde flow are associated with discrete atmospheric features, such as the Great Red Spot (GRS)
Summary
The Juno mission's JunoCam instrument (Hansen et al, 2017), conceived as a public‐outreach camera, has provided a surprising wealth of scientific results. These include the first close‐up examination of Jupiter's polar regions (Orton et al, 2017), in particular, the unexpected presence and properties of constellations of cyclonic vortices around each pole (Adriani et al, 2018; Tabataba‐Vakili et al, 2020). The planet‐encircling New Horizons waves were a surprise, as were the larger waves observed by HST and ground‐based imaging for the past 4 years, which Cassini would have detected. We discuss quantitative properties of the waves and conclude with an analysis and discussion section
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