Jupiter has no surface, so what would happen if you fell into it? In 1995 NASA's Galileo probe did exactly that and radioed back 58 minutes of data on the way down. We follow it through the radiation, clouds and storms, then keep going with physics and Juno's gravity data, through helium rain and metallic hydrogen to a "fuzzy" core with no clear edge.

🎧 Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6Ac2pRp4qYvJ2C7NLenHr3

▶ Watch the video, with every source and image credit: https://youtu.be/4Bau3dnWrbY

Eight Minutes Old on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@EightMinutesOld · TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@eightminutesold · Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eightminutesold

Chapters

0:00 Jupiter has no surface

0:27 Getting there alive

1:11 The "surface" and the clouds

1:57 The shrinking Great Red Spot

2:19 Lightning and mushballs

2:40 The Galileo probe's last hour

3:20 No measurements from here down

3:55 Helium rain

4:22 An ocean of metal

4:50 The fuzzy core

5:33 Is Jupiter a failed star?

5:47 No bottom

Beyond the Galileo probe's 58 minutes of data, the descent is a physics-based thought experiment; models of Jupiter's core are still debated.

Sources

• NASA Jupiter fact sheet: https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/jupiterfact.html

• Seiff et al. 1998, JGR (Galileo probe temperature profile): https://doi.org/10.1029/98JE01766

• Brygoo et al. 2021, Nature (helium rain): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03516-0

• Wahl et al. 2017, GRL (dilute core): https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL073160

• Militzer et al. 2022, PSJ (Juno interior models): https://doi.org/10.3847/PSJ/ac7ec8

• NASA, Galileo mission: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/galileo/

Labels: in the video every claim carries an on-screen label (FACT, THEORY, ESTIMATE, HYPOTHESIS, SPECULATION); in this audio edition the narration says out loud when something is an estimate or a thought experiment.

Narration: synthetic voice. Music: original.

#space #astronomy #science #eightminutesold