Atmosphere of Jupiter - Notes

Notes

1. ^ The scale height sh is defined as sh = RT/(Mg_j), where R = 8.31 J/mol/K is the gas constant, M ≈ 0.0023 kg/mol is the average molar mass in the Jovian atmosphere, T is temperature and g_j ≈ 25 m/s2 is the gravitational acceleration at the surface of Jupiter. As the temperature varies from 110 K in the tropopause up to 1000 K in the thermosphere, the scale height can assume values from 15 to 150 km.
2. ^ The Galileo atmospheric probe failed to measure the deep abundance of oxygen, because the water concentration continued to increase down to the pressure level of 22 bar, when it ceased operating. While the actually measured oxygen abundances are much lower than the solar value, the observed rapid increase of water content of the atmosphere with depth makes it highly likely that the deep abundance of oxygen indeed exceeds the solar value by a factor of about 3—much like other elements.
3. ^ Various explanations of the overabundance of carbon, oxygen, nitrogen and other elements have been proposed. The leading one is that Jupiter captured a large number of icy planetesimals during the later stages of its accretion. The volatiles like noble gases are thought to have been trapped as clathrate hydrates in water ice.