ConceptChecks
ConceptCheck 12-1: No. Solid objects cannot undergo differential rotation because all parts of a solid object rotate together.
ConceptCheck 12-2: If the planets formed with the same chemical composition, then helium in Saturn’s colder atmosphere could have condensed and moved deeper inside, resulting in Saturn appearing to be mostly hydrogen.
ConceptCheck 12-3: White ovals are long-lasting, low-temperature, high-altitude features that obscure views of what lies underneath. Brown ovals are openings in Jupiter’s cloud cover that emit more infrared energy from higher-temperature material at lower altitudes.
ConceptCheck 12-4: Jupiter has significantly more mass, and as a result the cloud layers are gravitationally compressed much more on Jupiter than on less massive Saturn.
ConceptCheck 12-5: We expect the Sun and Jupiter to have formed from the same material—the solar nebula—each with the same abundances of noble gases. Because the noble gases do not undergo chemical reactions with other atoms and molecules, their observed abundance today is thought to be representative of the abundance when the Sun and Jupiter formed.
ConceptCheck 12-6: Yes. All else being equal, increasing the rotation rate increases the oblateness.
ConceptCheck 12-7: Yes. Some charged particles ejected by Io’s volcanism can join the ion-trapping belts around Jupiter. Just as on Earth, when these ions stream along the magnetic field, they can cause aurorae at Jupiter’s magnetic poles.
ConceptCheck 12-8: As Saturn travels around the Sun, the tilted and quite thin rings are sometimes seen somewhat “face-on” and are easily observed, whereas at other times the view from Earth makes the rings “edge-on” and nearly invisible.
ConceptCheck 12-9: An asteroid orbiting Earth within Earth’s Roche limit for enough time would be ripped apart by Earth’s gravitational attraction differing on the near side and the far side of the asteroid (which is a tidal force), resulting in a tiny ring of debris orbiting Earth.
ConceptCheck 12-10: Slight color variations indicate differences in material making the rings. If this material migrated quickly, color variations would be smeared out; instead, there are some very narrow ring features with different colors in Figure 12-22.
ConceptCheck 12-11: The Cassini division is created by a destabilizing 2-to-1 orbital resonance with Saturn’s moon Mimas. Due to this resonance, repeated gravitational tugs clear out any particles at this location. If Mimas orbited farther away, its period would increase, and the Cassini division would appear farther out as well (where its dislodged particles also had a larger period).