This week’s images of Saturn from 2024 were just released by NASA. They show the planet in a variety of ways, depending on the telescope and instruments being used. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST or Webb) and Hubble Space Telescope each have their own unique abilities that can bring the distant gas giant to life.
In its comments on the two images above, NASA noted:
Together, scientists can effectively ‘slice’ through Saturn’s atmosphere at multiple altitudes, like peeling back the layers of an onion. Each telescope tells a different part of Saturn’s story, and the observations together help researchers understand how Saturn’s atmosphere works as a connected three-dimensional system. Both complement previous observations done by NASA’s Cassini orbiter during its time studying the Saturnian system from 1997 to 2017...These 2024 observations, taken 14 weeks apart, show the planet moving from northern summer toward the 2025 equinox. As Saturn transitions into southern spring, and later southern summer in the 2030’s, Hubble and Webb will have progressively better views of that hemisphere.
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