49K views · 1.5K reactions | NASA released the closest-ever images of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot. | Insider Science | Facebook

What Jupiter’s spot is not, is tranquil. New infrared images taken by Boston University scientists on a NASA telescope in Hawaii show that whereas Jupiter’s north and south poles are heated by strong magnetic fields, its large, stormy red spot generates its own heat by a different mechanism. Shock waves from turbulent winds in the spot and other storms help explain how the planet's upper atmosphere stays warm so far from the sun. Produced with support from Explore Scientific (explorescientificus

71K views · 1.6K reactions | NASA’s Juno spacecraft got its first up-close-and-personal view of Jupiter’s 10,000-mile-wide Great Red Spot. The flyby marked only the seventh time that Juno has made a close sweep — known as a perijove pass — of Jupiter since the spacecraft began orbiting the solar system’s biggest planet last summer. | PBS NewsHour | Facebook