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'Textbooks will need to be updated': Jupiter is smaller and flatter than we thought, Juno spacecraft reveals (www.livescience.com)
submitted 9 months ago by to c/space@mander.xyz
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Jupiter is slightly smaller and flatter than scientists thought for decades, a new study finds.

Researchers used radio data from the Juno spacecraft to refine measurements of the solar system's largest planet. Although the differences between the current and previous measurements are small, they are improving models of Jupiter's interior and of other gas giants like it outside the solar system, the team reported Feb. 2 in the journal Nature Astronomy.

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[–] 3 points 9 months ago (1 child)

Wouldn't something of that size necessarily turn spherical due to its mass?

Or is there enough inertia from the planet spinning that it bulges at the equator?

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