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Average Distance From Sun:	778,412,010 km
Diameter:	142,984 Km
Volume:	1316 x Earth Standard
Mass:	1,898.7 × 1027 g
GRAVITY:	59.54 km/s (at equator)
Atmosphere:	Hydrogen & other gases
Moons :	63 (See Table)
Jupiter Year:	11.862615 sidereal years
Equator Inclination:	3.12 degrees
Jupiter Day:	9hrs 50mins

The fifth planet	from the Sun, and the largest in the solar system. Jupiter is largely composed of hydrogen and helium, liquefied by pressure in its interior, and probably with a rocky core larger than the Earth. The pressure inside Jupiter may be 30 million times greater than the pressure at Earth's surface.
	It is commonly asserted that Galileo was the first to see Jupiter's satellites (Io, Europia, Ganymede, and Callisto),in 1610; and another German astronomer S. Mayer seems to have discovered the satellites ten days earlier than Galileo. But it is quite possible that they were sighted much earlier, though not telescopically, of course. A Chinese astronomer named Gan De had already discovered Jupiter’s satellites two thousand years before both of them. At the 5th magnitude and several arc minutes from the planet, a satellite would be visible with the naked eye. Observations made by Gan De, one of China's earliest astronomers, in the 4th B.C. State that there were four large satellites of Jupiter near to a red star...
Jupiter	will appear as a brilliant silver-white "star" in the constellation of Libra, the Scales. It will be primarily a late-night/early morning object from January through April 2006. By May and June it will be visible most of the night and will continue to be a convenient evening object through the end of October. It is at opposition to the Sun on May 4. It will disappear into the Sun's glow in early November and will again become visible in the morning sky during early December. to read more
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Jupiter`s main feature	is the Great Red Spot, a cloud of rising gases, revolving anticlockwise, 14,000 km wide and some 30,000 km long. Its visible surface consists of clouds of white ammonia crystals, drawn out into belts by the planet's high speed of rotation. Darker orange and brown clouds at lower levels may contain sulphur, as well as simple organic compounds. Further down still, temperatures are warm, a result of heat left over from Jupiter's formation, and it is this heat that drives the turbulent weather patterns of the planet. The Great Red Spot was first observed 1664. Its top is higher than the surrounding clouds; its colour is thought to be due to red phosphorus. Its strong magnetic field, generated by its electrically conducting liquid interior, gives rise to a large surrounding magnetic `shell', or magnetosphere, from which bursts of radio waves are detected. The planet Jupiter is a source of huge radio storms. Click the link to hear the live audio stream. Check the table for storm times.
	Click here for large colourmap Jupiter Radio Storm Calendar: Listen :24k realplayer stream.
The Southern Equatorial Belt	in which the Great Red Spot occurs is subject to unexplained fluctuation. In 1989 it sustained a dramatic and sudden fading. The four largest moons, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto, are the Galilean satellites, discovered in 1610 by Galileo (Ganymede is the largest moon in the solar system). Three small moons were discovered in 1979 by the Voyager space probes, as was a faint ring of dust around Jupiter's equator, 55,000 km above the cloud tops.
Scientists now believe that the formation of Jupiter,	the heavy-weight champion of the Solar System's planets, may have spawned some of the tiniest and oldest constituents of our Solar System - millimetre-sized spheres called chondrules, the major component of primitive meteorites. The study, by theorists Dr. Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution and Prof. Richard H. Durisen of Indiana University, is published in the March 10, 2005, issue of The Astrophysical Journal. "Understanding what formed the chondrules has been one of the biggest problems in the field for over a century," commented Boss. "Scientists realized several years ago that a shock wave was probably responsible for generating the heat that cooked these meteoritic components. But no one could explain convincingly how the shock front was generated in the solar nebula some 4.6 billion years ago. These latest calculations show how a shock front could have formed as a result of spiral arms roiling the solar nebula at Jupiter's orbit. The shock front extended into the inner solar nebula, where the compressed gas and radiation heated the dust particles as they struck the shock front at 20,000 mph, thereby creating chondrules.” to read more (pdf) However it should be noted that nearby supernova explosions would also create the chondrules, and explain the presence of natural decay products of radioactive nuclides found in primitive meteorites... In addition, Tungsten Isotopes also provide evidence that the core formation in some asteroids predates the accretion of chondrite parent bodies. to read more (pdf)
The hottest spot	in the solar system is Io, one of the four satellites that orbit Jupiter. The Galileo spacecraft, named in honor of the astronomer Galileo, found volcanic hot spots with temperatures as high as 2,910 Fahrenheit (1,610 Celsius). Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis show Io is vaporizing rock gases into it`s atmosphere... Computer models of volcanic eruptions on Io performed by researchers show that the lavas are so hot that they are vaporizing sodium, potassium, silicon and iron and probably other gases as well . "It's amazing how hot and how volcanically active Io is. It is 30 times more active than Earth. It's the hottest body outside of the sun in the solar system."
The Cassini spacecraft	has photographed an extraordinary dark cloud on Jupiter's north pole, twice as big as Earth itself. Similar to the `great red spot' The great Dark Spot!
Jupiter's atmosphere	still contains remnants of a comet impact from a decade ago, but scientists are puzzled by how two substances, carbon dioxide hydrogen cyanide and have spread into different locations. From July 16 through July 22, 1994, more than 20 fragments of Comet P/Shoemaker-Levy 9 collided with the gaseous planet, all coming in at about the same latitude, 45 degrees south. Fragments up to 1.2 miles (2 kilometres) sent plumes of hot gas into the Jovian atmosphere. Dark scars lasted for weeks. The Cassini spacecraft, now at Saturn, examined Jupiter as it swung by. A new study draws on infrared data from Cassini collected in 2000 and 2001. The hydrogen cyanide has diffused some both north and south, mixed by wave activity. Jupiter's cloud bands carry material around the planet swiftly, but the bands do not mix easily. Not surprisingly, hydrogen cyanide is most abundant in a belt at the latitude where the comet was absorbed. At five degrees of latitude change in both directions, its presence drops off sharply.
Katharina Lodders, Ph.D.,	Washington University in St. Louis research associate professor in Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences have proposed a new mechanism by which the planet Jupiter formed 4.5 billion years ago after studying data from the Galileo probe. Lodders' theoretical model assumes an outer solar system warmer than previously thought. Her theory replaces what astronomers call the "snow line," the point in the solar nebula where water ice condenses, with the new "tar line," the point where asphalt or tar-like material formed, pushing the `snow line` farther out in the solar nebula towards the Kuiper belt. to read more
New observations of Jupiter's moon,	Amalthea Amalthea, reveal that it probably didn't form with the giant planet. The observations were made with the powerful Subaru Telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, which found that Amalthea has unusual amounts of water-carrying minerals. These typically form in low temperature environments. Astronomers theorize that Jupiter's moons formed from several small objects merging, and Amalthea could be an example of one of these building blocks that never had a chance to merge. to read more
Astronomers using the ESA's XMM-Newton	Jupiter's atmosphere telescope have discovered that observing Jupiter's atmosphere may actually give them an insight in to solar activity on the far side of the Sun. It was discovered that Jupiter's x-ray glow is due to x-ray photons from the Sun being reflected back off the planet's atmosphere, with typically about one in a few thousand x-ray photons reflected back. "We found that Jupiter's day-to-day disk x-rays were synchronised with the Sun's emissions." to read more
So far as astronomers know,	the more than 100 giant planets found outside our solar system might be something like Jupiter. Only one has had its atmosphere probed. Better knowledge of the substances in Jupiter, and how things move around, should help set the stage for grasping the formation and evolution of gaseous extrasolar planets The highest concentration of carbon dioxide, however, has shifted away from the latitude of the impact. It is most prevalent pole ward of 60 degrees south and decreases abruptly, toward the equator, north of 50 degrees south. Another smaller spike in its presence occurs at high northern latitudes, around 70 - 90 degrees north.
Scientists have obtained new insight	Jupiter's auroras into the unique power source for many of Jupiter's auroras, the most spectacular and active auroras in the Solar System. Extended monitoring of the giant planet with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory detected the presence of highly charged particles crashing into the atmosphere above its poles. Electric voltages of about 10 million volts, and currents of 10 million amps - a hundred times greater than the most powerful lightning bolts - are required to explain the X-ray observations. These voltages would also explain the radio emission from energetic electrons observed near Jupiter by the Ulysses spacecraft. Chandra and Hubble data indicate that this auroral activity was caused by the acceleration of charged ions of oxygen and other elements trapped in the polar magnetic field high above Jupiter's atmosphere. to read more
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