Jupiter blues: Nasa's Juno captures swirling Jovian clouds in jaw-dropping image

Nasa captures Jupiter's higher altitude clouds casting a shadow over their surroundings.

Nasa has shared a new image of Jupiter, revealing striking features of the massive gas giant and its turbulent atmosphere.

The breathtaking image, captured by the Juno spacecraft on 27 October, looks more like an artistic conception or a drop of oil in water, but it is actually the northern hemisphere of the Jovian planet and clouds swirling over it – painted in blue and grey.

Nasa shares jaw-dropping image of Jupiter — Nasa captures stunning image of Jupiter and its clouds NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstädt/ Seán Doran

Juno took the photo during its ninth close flyby of the planet when it was approximately 18,906km above the surface of the clouds. The probe was just at the right place and time to use its JunoCam instrument and capture the higher-altitude clouds casting a shadow on their surroundings.

"The behaviour is most easily observable in the whitest regions in the image, but also in a few isolated spots in both the bottom and right areas of the image," says Nasa. Scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran enhanced the image to bring it out the white, blue, and grey features more effectively.

The photo adds another stellar image to the massive collection of Jupiter images captured by Juno. Not only Jupiter, the probe has even showcased its moons and how they cast a shadow over the massive gas giant during its flybys.