Scientists have discovered something weird about Jupiter's magnetic field

Jupiter.
(Image credit: iStock/martin_adams2000)

Each planet in our solar system has its own weird quirk — Venus' poisonous atmosphere, Saturn's rings, or Mars' potential to harbor human life. In a new study published in the journal Nature, scientists have discovered something strange about Jupiter as well.

Jupiter, like Earth, has a magnetic field. But unlike Earth's, Jupiter's magnetic field isn't relatively symmetrical. Instead, its northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere have magnetic fields that look nothing alike, Gizmodo reported. Where Earth's magnetic field points pretty much straight up and down, like a bar magnet, Jupiter's magnetic field is more like "someone took a bar magnet, bent it in half, and splayed it at both ends," Science News explained.

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Shivani is the editorial assistant at TheWeek.com and has previously written for StreetEasy and Mic.com. A graduate of the physics and journalism departments at NYU, Shivani currently lives in Brooklyn and spends free time cooking, watching TV, and taking too many selfies.