IN BRIEF

Hubble has just confirmed a new Dark Spot on the surface of Neptune. The vortex is ultimately the first observed on the blue world in the 21st century.

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope confirmed a new dark vortex in Neptune’s atmosphere. And it’s as wide as the continental United States.

Announced just a few days ago (June 23), images captured by the telescope confirmed the existence of the vortex, the first one observed in the 21st century.

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Credit: hubblesite.org

Neptune’s dark vortices are high-pressure systems and are usually accompanied by bright “companion clouds,” which are also now visible on the distant planet. The bright clouds form when the flow of ambient air is perturbed and diverted upward over the dark vortex, causing gases to likely freeze into methane ice crystals.

Observers reported seeing bright clouds on Neptune in July 2015, possible signs of companion clouds accompanying a dark vortex.

In September 2015, the Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) program, revealed a dark spot close to the location of the bright clouds, which had been tracked from the ground. The new Hubble images captured May 16 confirmed OPAL’s findings.