Catch up TV

This episode is currently not available.

2018: 5. Jupiter Revealed



'To send a spacecraft there is a little bit insane,' says Scott Bolton when talking about Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system. But that is exactly what he has done, because Scott is head of Juno, the Nasa mission designed to peer through Jupiter's swirling clouds and reveal the wonders within. But this is no ordinary world. This documentary, narrated by Toby Jones, journeys with the scientists into the heart of a giant.\n\nProfessor Kaitlin Kratter shows us how extreme Jupiter is. She has come to a quarry to measure out each planet's mass with rocks, starting with the smallest. Mercury is a single kilogram, and the Earth is 17. But Jupiter is on another scale entirely. It is seven tonnes - that is two and a half times the mass of all the other planets combined. On Kaitlin's scale it is not a pile of rocks, it is the truck delivering them. With extreme size comes extreme radiation. Juno is in the most extreme environment Nasa has visited. By projecting a 70-foot-wide, life-size Juno on a Houston rooftop, Scott shows us how its fragile electronics are encased in 200kg of titanium. As Scott puts it, 'we had to build an armoured tank to go there.'\n\nThe team's efforts have been worthwhile. Professor Andrew Ingersoll, Juno's space weatherman, reveals they have seen lightning inside Jupiter, perhaps a thousand times more powerful than Earth's lightning. This might be evidence for huge quantities of water inside Jupiter. Prof Ingersoll also tells us that the Great Red Spot, a vast hurricane-like storm that could swallow the Earth whole, goes down as far as they can see - 'it could go down 1,000s of kilometres'.\n\nDeeper into the planet and things get stranger still. At the National Ignition facility in northern California, Dr Marius Millot is using powerful lasers normally used for nuclear fusion for an astonishing experiment. He uses '500 times the power that is used for the entire United States at a given moment' to crush hydrogen to the pressures inside Jupiter. Under these extreme conditions, hydrogen becomes a liquid metal. Juno is finding out how much liquid metallic hydrogen is inside Jupiter, and scientists hope to better understand how this flowing metal produces the most powerful aurora in the Solar System.\n\nBut what is at Jupiter's heart? In Nice, Prof Tristan Guillot explains how Juno uses gravity to map the planet's centre. This can take scientists back to the earliest days of the solar system, because Jupiter is the oldest planet and it should contain clues to its own creation. By chalking out an outline of the Jupiter, Tristan reveals there is a huge rocky core - perhaps ten times the mass of Earth. It is now thought Jupiter started as a small rocky world. But there is a surprise, because Juno's findings suggest this core might be 'fuzzy'. Tristan thinks the planet was bombarded with something akin to shooting stars. As he puts it, 'Jupiter is quite unlike we thought'.

Source: BBC 2

Most recent episodes of Horizon

Horizon

Horizon - 2020: What's The Matter With Tony Slattery?

2020: What's The Matter With Tony Slattery?

Tony Slattery was one of the most gifted TV comedians of the late 80s and early 90s. One of the Cambridge Footlight set that included Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie and Emma Thompson, ...

10-02-2025

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2014-2015: 11. 70 Million Animal Mummies: Egypt's Dark Secret

2014-2015: 11. 70 Million Animal Mummies: Egypt's Dark Secret

04-02-2025

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - Life Story: A Horizon Special

Life Story: A Horizon Special

It's 1951. There's a race on, and two of the brightest and brashest young men in Cambridge are determined to win it. The prize is glittering. Eternal fame, glory and almost cert ...

11-12-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: Antarctica - Ice Station Rescue

2017: Antarctica - Ice Station Rescue

10-11-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2020: Hubble: The Wonders Of Space Revealed

2020: Hubble: The Wonders Of Space Revealed

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of its launch, this film tells the remarkable story of how Hubble revealed the awe and wonder of our universe and how a team of daring astronau ...

04-11-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2020: Pluto: Back From The Dead

2020: Pluto: Back From The Dead

The incredible story of how Pluto has been propelled from an unremarkable ball of ice on the edge of the solar system to a world of unimaginable complexity - where some form of ...

28-10-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2015-2016: 8. Ice Station Antarctica

2015-2016: 8. Ice Station Antarctica

26-10-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2016-2017: 1. The Wildest Weather In The Universe

2016-2017: 1. The Wildest Weather In The Universe

21-10-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: Mars - A Traveller's Guide

2017: Mars - A Traveller's Guide

14-10-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: Space Volcanoes

2017: Space Volcanoes

07-10-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Most popular episodes of Horizon

Horizon

Horizon - Beyond The Moon

Beyond The Moon

A chance to look back at a classic Horizon special in which James Burke looks at space exploration and exploitation. Originally transmitted in 1984, James begins by looking at t ...

16-12-2015

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: Antarctica - Ice Station Rescue

2017: Antarctica - Ice Station Rescue

10-11-2024

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2009-2010: 8. The Secret Life Of The Dog

2009-2010: 8. The Secret Life Of The Dog

09-05-2019

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2018: 8. The Placebo Experiment: Can My Brain Cure My Body?

2018: 8. The Placebo Experiment: Can My Brain Cure My Body?

Could the power of fake pills be used to treat some of our most common medical complaints? To find out, Dr Michael Mosley embarks on Britain's largest ever trial to investigate ...

04-03-2019

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2015-2016: 6. Should We Close Our Zoos?

2015-2016: 6. Should We Close Our Zoos?

17-04-2016

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2015-2016: 2. Project Greenglow - The Quest For Gravity Control

2015-2016: 2. Project Greenglow - The Quest For Gravity Control

24-06-2019

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2014-2015: 13. The Trouble With Space Junk

2014-2015: 13. The Trouble With Space Junk

04-12-2021

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: Adhd And Me With Rory Bremner

2017: Adhd And Me With Rory Bremner

25-04-2017

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - The Hunt For The Higgs: A Horizon Special

The Hunt For The Higgs: A Horizon Special

12-01-2015

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

Horizon

Horizon - 2017: 10 Things You Need To Know About The Future

2017: 10 Things You Need To Know About The Future

17-04-2023

BBC 2

All episodes

BBC 2

© 2025 - Catchupplayer.co.uk