Megastorms form on Saturn every 20-30 years. Surprisingly, the influence of such storms is so great that the atmosphere retains chemical evidence for centuries.
As per the official release, megastorms on the ringed planet are similar to hurricanes on Earth but far greater.
Astronomers examined radio emissions from the planet's surface using the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array in New Mexico for this study.The researchers measured ammonia concentrations at various atmospheric altitudes because they move through the planet's atmosphere like water. “Radio observations help characterize dynamical, physical, and chemical processes, including heat transport, cloud formation and convection in the atmospheres of giant planets on both global and local scales,” added de Pater.
They discovered that the distribution of ammonia is depleted at mid-altitudes . Still, it is relatively abundant at lower altitudes — around 100 to 200 kilometers deeper in the atmosphere.
Canada Latest News, Canada Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Storms on Saturn are so huge that their traces last hundreds of yearsEvery couple of decades Saturn develops a huge storm, and now researchers have found that the atmosphere keeps chemical records of those storms for hundreds of years
Read more »
Astronomers discovered a mirror planet with metal cloudsAstronomers have finally figured out why a planet discovered in 2020 is able to reflect much of its star's light like a mirror.
Read more »
Astronomers Observe Crazy Time Dilation in the Ancient UniverseBy observing quasars from 12 billion years ago, astronomers have seen the universe flow in slow-mo, thanks to wonky time dilation.
Read more »
Astronomers discover mysterious 'Trojan' planets that share the same orbitA distant Jupiter-size planet could have the shattered remains of a smaller sibling in its tow.
Read more »
Planets might have 'siblings,' astronomers findA cloud of debris is seemingly orbiting around a star in the same path as another planet, in the first evidence of two exoplanets sharing an orbit.
Read more »
How astronomers traced a puzzling signal to a lunchtime mistakeThe unusual radio wave turned out to have a rather mundane Earthly origin. But the puzzle wasn't easy to solve.
Read more »