{"id":25080,"date":"2021-10-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/?post_type=purple_issue&#038;p=25080"},"modified":"2021-10-21T12:29:05","modified_gmt":"2021-10-21T12:29:05","slug":"ice-giants-secret-ammonia-stash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/2021\/10\/21\/ice-giants-secret-ammonia-stash\/","title":{"rendered":"Ice giants\u2019 secret ammonia stash"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center intro\">Uranus and Neptune may be hoarding ammonia \u2018mushballs\u2019 deep within their atmospheres<\/p>\n\n<figure class=\"no-tts wp-block-image article-in-image photo\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1583\" height=\"1111\" src=\"https:\/\/dj9jqhxgw9833.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"no-tts wp-image-25078\" srcset=\"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6.jpg 1583w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-300x211.jpg 300w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-1024x719.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-768x539.jpg 768w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-1536x1078.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1583px) 100vw, 1583px\" \/><figcaption>  The outermost planets could be burying the gas in hailstones<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">Neptune and<strong> <\/strong>Uranus could be storing ammonia deep in their atmospheres as \u2018mushballs\u2019 \u2013 hailstones made of ammonia and water. The planets appear to lack ammonia compared to other planets, and Tristan Guillot from the Laboratoire Lagrange in Nice might have found out why in his latest study, which searched for the answer on Jupiter.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">\u201cThe Juno spacecraft has shown that on Jupiter ammonia is present in abundance, but generally much deeper than expected \u2013 thanks to the formation of mushballs,\u201d says Guillot.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">These mushballs form in storms at high altitude, trapping ammonia inside. Weighing up to a kilo, they fall through the atmosphere<span> carrying the ammonia with them. On Uranus and Neptune, the portion of the atmosphere that forms mushballs is much higher.<\/span><\/p>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">\u201cThus, ammonia is probably simply hidden in the deep atmospheres of these planets, beyond the reach of presentday instruments,\u201d says Guillot. <a href=\"https:\/\/lagrange.oca.eu\/en\">lagrange.oca.eu\/en\/welcome-lagrange<\/a><\/p>\n\n<p>IMAGES: NASA\/CALTECH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Uranus and Neptune may be hoarding ammonia deep within their atmospheres<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":25078,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ub_ctt_via":"","purple_page_number":"13","purple_custom_meta_purple_page_number":"13","purple_seq_number":"1","purple_custom_meta_purple_seq_number":"1","purple_source_article":"article_13-1.xml","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_article":"article_13-1.xml","purple_source_issue":"November-2021","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_issue":"November-2021","purple_external_id":"November-2021-13-1","purple_custom_meta_purple_external_id":"November-2021-13-1","purple_issue_code":"|0000086546||","purple_custom_meta_purple_issue_code":"|0000086546||","purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.198","purple_custom_meta_purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.198","purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.198","purple_custom_meta_purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.198","purple_web_product":"","purple_custom_meta_purple_web_product":"","purple_publication_id":"075fab74-0a21-4201-866a-899d6c41c40c","purple_migrated":"","kt_blocks_editor_width":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[14],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"< 1","apple_news_title":""},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6.jpg",1583,1111,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-300x211.jpg",300,211,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-768x539.jpg",768,539,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-1024x719.jpg",800,562,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6-1536x1078.jpg",1536,1078,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2021\/10\/ecb59a6d-6a72-4bcb-96f8-1453033c62e6.jpg",1583,1111,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Uranus and Neptune may be hoarding ammonia deep within their atmospheres","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25080"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25080"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25851,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25080\/revisions\/25851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}