Washington – Washington (AP) – Neptune Bright auroras are captured in the best detail so far by NASA James Webb Space telescope.
Auroras suggestions were first detected with ultraviolet light during an overflow of the Voyager 2 spacecraft in 1989. Webb captured the bright lights of Neptune in the infrared light, providing direct evidence that they exist.
NASA launched the images on Wednesday, and the results were published in the magazine Astronomy of nature.
The auroras on any planet occur when electrically charged particles from space enter and collide with molecules in the atmosphere, creating a series of reactions that emit light.
On earthThe auroras tend to occur near the polar regions, producing spectacular north and south lights.
Scientists have studied Auroras in Saturn and Jupiter for decades, but Neptune, the planet farther from the sun, has been more difficult to see closely.
“Neptune has always been elusive,” said planetary scientist at Reading University James O’Donoghue, co -author of the new study. It’s Auroras “it had only been seen by Voyager, and we have been trying to see him again.”
The Auroras of Neptune are close to the average latitudes of the planet, not in the polar regions, due to the differences in their magnetic field, which determine the span of the auroras, said O’Donoghue.
More than three decades after Voyager 2’s pass, scientists have seen Neptune auroras again with the powerful Webb telescope, producing “the first robust detection,” said Co -author Heidi Hammel of the Association of Universities for Astronomy Research, in an email.
The researchers also revealed that Neptune’s atmosphere has cooled significantly since the 1980s, which may have a little mitigated the light of the auroras.
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