APOD: 2026 January 18 – Jupiter from the Webb Space Telescope

Good morning, Rallypoint, and welcome to the January 18, 2026 edition of Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD).

If you are thinking that something is wrong with Jupiter's Great Red Spot, don't worry...we are seeing Jupiter in infrared from the James Webb Space Telescope. And you may be seeing some Jovian features that you had not noticed before. Like polar (both north and south) auroras. And rings. Jupiter's moon Io is off camera to the left.

The 'streaks' you see about bright objects are visual artifacts called diffraction spikes. They are caused by the 18 hexagonal segments in the primary mirror used by Webb to gather data. You can check out https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/optical-telescope-element-ote/ if you'd like to learn more.