JAKE ELLISON, SPECIAL TO SEATTLEPI.COM

Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Roman Tkachenko

The Junocam is a color-imaging eye pointed at the Jovian planet. Its gaze is be mostly directed by the public via a public-voting platform. The camera then takes raw images of areas both directed by the public and scientists. Once the images are uploaded, citizens with little to read or watch or otherwise distract themselves with other than news about the new U.S. president are invited to modify the images and upload them to the NASA website. Here are some to enjoy.

Citizen image (NASA caption): NASAs Juno spacecraft skimmed the upper wisps of Jupiters atmosphere when JunoCam snapped this image on Feb. 2 at 5:13 a.m. PT (8:13 a.m. ET), from an altitude of about 9,000 miles (14,500 kilometers) above the giant planets swirling cloudtops. Streams of clouds spin off a rotating oval-shaped cloud system in the Jovian southern hemisphere. Citizen scientist Roman Tkachenko reconstructed the color and cropped the image to draw viewers eyes to the storm and the turbulence around it.

The Junocam is a color-imaging eye pointed at the Jovian planet. Its gaze is be mostly directed by the public via a public-voting platform. The camera then takes raw images of areas both directed by the public

NASA caption: NASAs Juno spacecraft soared directly over Jupiters south pole when JunoCam acquired this image on February 2, 2017 at 6:06 a.m. PT (9:06 a.m. ET), from an altitude of about 62,800 miles (101,000 kilometers) above the cloud tops. From this unique vantage point we see the terminator (where day meets night) cutting across the Jovian south polar regions restless, marbled atmosphere with the south pole itself approximately in the center of that border.

NASA caption: NASAs Juno spacecraft soared directly over Jupiters south pole when JunoCam acquired this image on February 2, 2017 at 6:06 a.m. PT (9:06 a.m. ET), from an altitude of about 62,800 miles

NASA capiton: Cyclones swirl around the south pole, and white oval storms can be seen near the limb -- the apparent edge of the planet -- in this image of Jupiters south polar region taken by the JunoCam imager aboard NASAs Juno spacecraft.

NASA capiton: Cyclones swirl around the south pole, and white oval storms can be seen near the limb -- the apparent edge of the planet -- in this image of Jupiters south polar region taken by the JunoCam

Citizen image, title:in Landscape

NASA's Junocam project encourages the public to download the images of Jupiter and creatively modify them. This is one of those examples created by a citizen "artist-scientist."

Citizen image, title:in Landscape

NASA's Junocam project encourages the public to download the images of Jupiter and creatively modify them. This is one of those examples created by a citizen

Citizen image (NASA caption): This enhanced-color image of Jupiters south pole and its swirling atmosphere was created by citizen scientist Roman Tkachenko using data from the JunoCam imager on NASAs Juno spacecraft.

Citizen image (NASA caption): This enhanced-color image of Jupiters south pole and its swirling atmosphere was created by citizen scientist Roman Tkachenko using data from the JunoCam imager on NASAs Juno

Citizen image, title: Artified Swirls

Citizen image, title: Artified Swirls

Citizen image, title: Dark Spot

Citizen image, title: Dark Spot

Citizen image, title: Beyond the Clouds of Jupiter

Citizen image, title: Beyond the Clouds of Jupiter

Citizen image, title: Jupiter wallpaper 4

Citizen image, title: Jupiter wallpaper 4

Citizen image, title: 2017-02-11 04:31 UT

Citizen image, title: 2017-02-11 04:31 UT

Citizen image, title: The giant

Citizen image, title: The giant

Citizen image, title: Jovian

Citizen image, title: Jovian

Citizen image, title: DeepDream Convolution: Latitude Coverage

Citizen image, title: DeepDream Convolution: Latitude Coverage

Citizen image, title: Jupiter flow

Citizen image, title: Jupiter flow

Citizen image, title: The Mighty Winds of Jupiter

Citizen image, title: The Mighty Winds of Jupiter

Citizen image, title: 2017-02-26 12:27 UT

Citizen image, title: 2017-02-26 12:27 UT

Citizen image, title: Turbulence

Citizen image, title: Turbulence

Juno spooks NASA, sends back wild images from Jupiter

Risk averse NASA has decided to keep its spacecraft Juno on the looonnnggg orbit of Jupiter.

Earlier in February, the agency said it didn't want to risk firing the spacecraft's engines and bring it in for a closer zip around the mega-planet because of a slight glitch in two helium check valves. I know!

Yeah, NASA. Apparently the valves opened later than expected during a system charge and since they are "part of the plumbing for the spacecraft's main engine" ... well, better safe than sorry.

Faced with a new POTUS and some subtle give and take in the nation over the man and his executive orders, the agency was quick to point out the silver lining of the situation:

Juno's larger 53-day orbit allows for "bonus science" that wasn't part of the original mission design. Juno will further explore the far reaches of the Jovian magnetosphere the region of space dominated by Jupiter's magnetic field including the far magnetotail, the southern magnetosphere, and the magnetospheric boundary region called the magnetopause. Understanding magnetospheres and how they interact with the solar wind are key science goals of NASA's Heliophysics Science Division.

"Another key advantage of the longer orbit is that Juno will spend less time within the strong radiation belts on each orbit," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "This is significant because radiation has been the main life-limiting factor for Juno."

Meanwhile, one unique feature of the human-made object zooming around the largest planet in our solar system, of which nearly no conspiracy theories of alien life or government coverups exist (even fevered brains know it's too chaotic of a place for such things, though its moons are another thing all together ... ) is the Junocam.

The Junocam is a color-imaging eye pointed at the Jovian planet. Its gaze will be mostly* directed by the public via a public-voting platform. The camera then takes raw images of areas both directed by the public and scientists. Once the images are uploaded, citizens with little to read or watch or otherwise distract themselves with other than news about the new U.S. president are invited to modify the images and upload them to the NASA website.

In the gallery above, you can see images that NASA has produced from the camera, which are presumably representative of how the planet would look if you were floating just above it in the cold vacuum of space while being cooked by radiation.** And, just after those, you can see some of the images citizens have made of that rarest of vantage points.

* "Since the mission's beginnings, Junocam was intended almost entirely as a public outreach tool, in contrast to the spacecraft's other instruments that will address Juno's core science questions. Juno scientists will ensure Junocam returns a few great shots of Jupiter's polar regions, but the overwhelming majority of the camera's image targets will be chosen by the public, with the data being processed by them as well," NASA said.

** "Scientists believe that the combination of this metallic hydrogen along with Jupiter's fast rotation -- one day on Jupiter is only 10 hours long -- generates a powerful magnetic field that surrounds the planet with electrons, protons and ions traveling at nearly the speed of light. The endgame for any spacecraft that enters this doughnut-shaped field of high-energy particles is an encounter with the harshest radiation environment in the solar system," NASA wrote.

Jake Ellison can be reached at jakeellisonjournalism@gmail.com. Follow Jake on Twitter at twitter.com/Jake_News. Also, swing by and *LIKE* his page on Facebook. If Google Plus is your thing, check out our science coverage here.

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