Discovering Aurora on Neptune for the First Time with NASA’s Webb Telescope

The Northern and Southern Lights Vermillion, Amethyst, and Jade Ribbons are some of the most distinctive features of the Earth. However, our planet has no monopoly of the Aurora. Scientists spy on them throughout the solar system, weaving the Martian sky into Saturn, Jupiter and even some of Jupiter’s fiery softening.

The light shines in the sky Uranus too. However, the aurora around Neptune, the farthest planet of our Sun, has long escaped astronomers.

That was changed by the powerful infrared equipment installed in the James Webb Space Telescope. In a study published in the journal on Wednesday Natural Astronomy scientists reveal unique auroras spilling on either side of Neptune’s equator. This contrasts with the sparkling Gossamers, arcing at Poles in other worlds.

Astronomers are excited that the Aurora Hunting Quest has been completed over decades. “Everyone is very excited to prove it’s there, as we thought,” he said. Rosie Johnson an astrophysics researcher at Aberystwyth University in Wales who was not involved in new research.

The discovery allows scientists to study previously out-of-reach aspects of Neptune. “They use the aurora to understand the shape of the magnetic field on planets looking at the invisible,” he said. Karl Schmidt Boston University planetary astronomers were not involved in new research.

Each world produces aurora differently, but it is basically the same. Energy particles (often from the sun, but sometimes from the eruption of a lunar volcano) hit the atmosphere and bounce back the gas. The collision of the particles causes a temporary flash of light. And if there is a magnetic field in the world, it will guide the position…

Luckily, the Webb Telescope, released in 2021, came to rescue.

Heidi Hammel Another astronomer of the University Association for Astronomical Studies and the author of the research, has been studying Neptune since the 1980s. She said that if Webb “is powerful enough to see the early galaxies of the universe, it would be strong enough to see something like Neptune’s Aurorae.” “And by Golly, that was the case.”

Using the telescope’s near-infrared spectrometer, astronomers captured Neptune’s infrared aurora in June 2023. This is because Neptune has an unstable magnetic field tilted to 47 degrees from the planet’s spin axis.

New Webb observations also reveal why Neptune’s Auroras has never been visible until now. Almost 40 years ago, Voyager 2 recorded a temperature of about 900 degrees Fahrenheit in the Neptune’s upper atmosphere. However, the Webb telescope shows that the temperature has dropped nearly 200 degrees. This low temperature means that the aurora is a dimmer.

In fact, Neptune’s Aurora said, “It’s less than 1% of the expected brightness and explains why I’ve never seen it before.” James O’Donohew a planetary astronomer at the UK’s Reading University and one of the authors of the study. “But that means we have a new mystery in our hands now. How did Neptune get so cold?”

Neptune’s Strange Light Show detection may bring your answers closer.

“The Aurora is like a TV screen,” he said. Lee Fletcher a planetary scientist at the University of Leicester in the UK and one of the authors of the study. They said, “We are able to see the delicate dance of the magnetosphere processes.