NASA spacecraft detects light events on Jupiter for the first time - scientists predicted phenomenon

A NASA spacecraft has been observing Jupiter for four years.

This is the first time that the planet's colorful electrical bursts have been captured.

• NASA made

  exciting discoveries

  thanks to the Juno spacecraft orbiting Jupiter

  .

• Colorful, millisecond-long

  light events

  could be

  observed

  for the first time

  .

• Scientists predicted this phenomenon and it has now been

  confirmed

  .

Washington DC -

made an extraordinary discovery last week: thanks to the Juno spacecraft, lightning-like eruptions were

detected

on the gas planet

, which are known as transient

events.

More precisely, the glowing rays are called

, the jellyfish-shaped lightning bolts are called

(English "sprites").

New NASA discovery: researcher Rohini Giles declares breakthrough - "a total of 11 lightning bolts found"

These colorful flashes of

were now taken high in Jupiter's atmosphere.

The space probe has been orbiting

Jupiter

and has been collecting images in ultraviolet light since then

.

The

recently

noticed the

phenomenon

when evaluating the images

.

"In putting these images together, we found that we'd occasionally see these surprising, short-lived, bright

," said

, of the Juno team, at the press conference on Tuesday.

✨ Our @NASAJuno spacecraft may have detected "sprites" - bright, unpredictable, brief flashes of light - dancing in Jupiter's upper atmosphere.

Sprites occur on Earth above thunderstorms, but it's the first time they've been observed on another world: https://t.co/FCYZYlGd27 pic.twitter.com/A2iBiQGoPM

- NASA (@NASA) October 29, 2020

The researcher added that in light of the

"searched all of the data" recorded over the past four years of the mission.

The research team found “a total of

with very similar properties.” Each of these bursts only lasted a few milliseconds.

On Tuesday, a

on lightning was published

in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets

.

New NASA discovery: light events appear blue or pink - they also occur in the earth's atmosphere

The observed phenomena - the

and the

occur in thunderstorms in the upper atmosphere.

They were first

documented

in

, but until before the latest NASA discovery there was no evidence of

"goblins" or "elves".

at the time predicted that planets like Jupiter, which could produce lightning, would also produce these light events.

Now these theories have been proven.

"On Earth, sprites and elves appear

due to their interaction with nitrogen in the upper atmosphere,

" says researcher Giles.

“But

the upper atmosphere

on

consists mainly of

, so it is likely to appear either blue or pink.” The light phenomena occur when a lightning strike creates a larger “quasi-electrostatic field”.

"On #Earth, sprites and elves appear reddish in color due to their interaction with nitrogen in the upper atmosphere," Giles said.

"But on #Jupiter, the upper atmosphere mostly consists of hydrogen, so they would likely appear either blue or pink."

@NASA #Discovery #space pic.twitter.com/qpL7tM1iW7

- Business Insider India🇮🇳 (@BiIndia) October 28, 2020

"Now that we know what we're looking for, it'll be easier

to find

them on

and other planets," says Giles.

Thanks to the observations of Jupiter, one can make comparisons with the earth in order to “

better understand

the electrical activity in

”.

(ajr)