PLANET PROFILE JUPITER

Fifth in the eight-planet line-up of our Solar System, Jupiter also happens to be the largest, and by quite some distance. The mass of this gigantic ball of gas is two-and-a-half times that of all the other planets put together, and you could fit 11.2 Earths within its radius. While there’s likely a rocky core somewhere under the enormous gaseous atmosphere, scientists can’t be sure whether it’s solid or not, but gravitational measurements suggest it could make up as much as 15 per cent of Jupiter’s mass.

What is known is that Jupiter is contracting, and this generates more heat than the planet receives from the Sun, warming the huge number of moons that orbit around it. It also has a faint ring system, too thin to be seen from Earth with any but the largest telescopes and first spotted by the Voyager 1