New data showed that despite the onset of summer, much of the planet was gradually cooling in
This change is very unexpected. We observed Neptune in early summer and expected temperatures to slowly increase rather than cooler.
Michael Roman, research fellow at the University of Leicester in the UK
Like Earth, Neptune has seasons.But the season of Neptune lasts about 40 years, and one year is 165 Earth years. Since 2005, it has been summer in Neptune's southern hemisphere. Astronomers have studied nearly 100 thermal infrared images of Neptune over 17 years to study temperature trends in greater detail.
Neptune's average global temperature dropped by 8°C between 2003 and 2018. But later, astronomers were surprised when they discovered a sharp warming of the south pole of Neptune. Over the past two years of their observations, temperatures have risen rapidly by 11°C between 2018 and 2020. Such rapid polar warming has never been observed on the planet before.
Neptune temperature chart
Astronomers have studied the temperature of Neptune usingthermal imaging cameras, they measure the infrared light emitted by astronomical objects. For their analysis, the team combined all existing images of Neptune collected over the past two decades by ground-based telescopes. They investigated the infrared light emitted by Neptune's atmospheric layer. This allowed the team to build a picture of Neptune's temperature and its fluctuations during part of its austral summer.
Neptune's temperature fluctuations were sounexpected that astronomers do not yet know what could cause them. The authors suggest that the temperature changes could be due to changes in the chemical composition of the planet's stratosphere due to random weather patterns or even due to the solar cycle.
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