We love good Citizen Scientist stories– and this one is perfect! Amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley caught something in his telescope last weekend while glancing at Jupiter: a new dark spot. At the time he couldn’t decide whether he should keep his eye on it or email the news. He watched it for an hour before sending his first email. (You can read his entire account here.)

And scientists took notice. Telescopes have been pointed that way all week. Hubble took this image yesterday.

I didn’t realize how important Jupiter is in protecting the Earth from these flying objects. According to UC Berkeley’s Franck Marchis, “We should be thankful to have a large planet like Jupiter in our solar system. Jupiter is suffering for us receiving the impact of bolides coming from the outer part of the solar system because of its strong gravitational field.”

Thank you, Jupiter!

 

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