Jupiter’s **Great Red Spot (GRS)** is a massive, persistent anticyclonic storm located in Jupiter’s southern hemisphere. It is the largest storm in the Solar System, spanning approximately **16,350 km in diameter**—large enough to fit Earth inside it. The storm has been observed for over **350 years**, with records dating back to the 17th century.
### **Key Features of the GRS:**
1. **Anticyclonic Motion** – The storm rotates counterclockwise, with wind speeds reaching up to **432 km/h (268 mph)**.
2. **Color and Composition** – The red color is due to complex organic molecules, ammonia, and other compounds reacting with ultraviolet light.
3. **Shrinking Over Time** – Observations show the GRS has been shrinking since the 19th century when it was over 40,000 km wide. Today, it continues to shrink and change shape.
4. **Depth and Structure** – The storm extends **300–500 km into Jupiter’s atmosphere**, much deeper than Earth's strongest hurricanes.
5. **Interaction with Jet Streams** – The GRS is trapped between two strong jet streams, which help sustain it over centuries.
Would you like to know more about its formation, observations, or recent changes?
You've pretty much summed up what is known about the Spot, and only the title of your post refers to its origin, so I don't see why you suggested that. However, since you did, there is no reason to think that the Spot is anything other than a larger version of the numerous similar storms. It's larger than usual size is probably related to the fact that the speed of rotation of the various latitudinal bands increases as you move toward the Equator, so the shearing force at the edge of any given pair of bands moving in opposite directions relative to the overall rotation of the planet can create more powerful storms. Similar but smaller redder than usual spots have been observed near the Equator at times, and they probably have greater than usual depths, allowing them to bring molecules lying further down to the surface. So it is probably just a similar storm which happened to get big enough to last longer than most, and its origin is probably the same as all the other storms. But only the passage of another few centuries would allow us to see if the current Great Red Spot becomes small enough to become more ordinary, or if similar smaller storms ever get big enough to rival it.
One argument against the idea of an impact formation is that when Comet Shoemaker-Levy collided with Jupiter, although each object's impact created changes in the region near its impact, none of those changes lasted very long, or looked much like the multitude of 'ordinary' spots; but again, unless we wait for God only knows how long for larger objects to hit the planet, we won't be able to tell if impacts can create such storms.
The origin of Jupiter's red spot is related to the formation of Jupiter's core.
There is a similar point in all nuclear objects. During the formation of the nucleus and the continuation of the life of the nucleus, due to the interference of waves emanating from the nucleus, for some reason this point is formed at a specific point at a certain distance from the equator.
What you see on Jupiter's skin is the effects of that magnetic spot. The distance of this spot from the equator and its size change over time and repeat over time. As a result, the red spot gets bigger again in the future and then gets smaller and repeats.
This answer is from the results of the formation of the nucleus, which was discovered by me.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Physical Sciences
- Optics