if some outer planets are gaseous, then could a space probe theoretically fly through them?

Question

with them being made of gas? or are they too dense? but then surely no gas is too dense for an object to pass through, wouldn't that make it solid?

Answer 1

Many of the other Answerers have basically got it. While it is true that the gas giants are mostly "made of gas," the density of this gas changes dramatically the deeper into the planet - say, Jupiter - one goes.

At a certain point (I won't represent where; I'm no physicist) you're talking about such extremes of pressure that you may as well be dealing with a liquid. In fact, it may well BE a liquid. And much further in, you get weird stuff like "metallic hydrogen," as strange as that sounds.

However - it is certainly possible for space probes to fly through the outer atmosphere of the gas giants - and come out again. Google the term "aerobraking" for a further look at this.

In fact, the Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Polar Orbiter used aerobraking. They skimmed Mars's (very thin) atmosphere to slow themselves down enough to be captured by Mars's gravity. Pretty darn impressive.

There's no reason to think we won't use this technique to put probes into Jupiter's orbit, for instance, and maybe do some science along the way.

However, nature always has surprises, and this may not be so straightforward - see below link for a discussion.

Answer 2

An interesting question. The study of extra-solar planets is still in its infancy. The only planets with thick atmospheres that we know much about are the ones in our solar system. But it seems fairly certain that a gas planet needs to be big. That means very high pressures near the centre. The pressures near the centres of gas giants like Jupiter are so high that, although there's no sharply-defined surface, the material behaves more like a solid than a gas. Any hydrogen near the centre of these planets is metallic. Since these planets also contain carbon, it's even been suggested that they may have cores of diamond, the high pressure form of carbon. But even a planet as small as Earth made of gas would have very high pressures near the centre. When you compress air to a few hundred tonnes/ sq.cm., it becomes a waxy solid. And if you tried to make a gas planet small enough not to have a high pressure core, gravity would be so weak that it wouldn't hold together.

Answer 3

Nope. Any probe sent into a gseous planet would collide with the frozen gasses and if able to survive that would eventually crash into the metallic core. For example Jupiter has a metallic hydrogen core. This metal requires so much pressure to create that we havent yet been able to produce it here on earth.
When the outer planets are referred to as gaseous planets, the reference is simply because they are made from gasses. Those gasses are compressed by great pressures that render them firstly, liquids, then solids, then metals.

Answer 4

A space probe could fly through solid lead if you built it well enough. There's a big difference between theoretically and practically.
Gas can have the density of uranium with enough pressure. And Gas giants do have solid cores.

Answer 5

Well it has to do with solar winds temp, and density. When the solar system was formed the densited things would stay in the center, because they were not as easily pushed by the solar wind. Mercury is made of very dense matter, it is mostly made of iron, and a small amount of litter elements. But Earth is the densest planet, because it has more iron then mercury in its core, but it also has much more lighter elements. When you get into the outer solar system, the temp is cooler and ice crystals start to form together, and since ice is not very dense the ice balls can grow huge, and once they get big enough they start to collect massive amounts of gas, and this gas adds mass and collects more and more. And since the solar winds are so weak in the outer solar system they gas is not blown away, like it is from the inner planets. So a gas planet could never form in the inner solar solar system.

Answer 6

I think that... the gas on the surface would be penetrable, but not the liquid gas or the frozen gas ? or is it the other way around ? anyway... gas planets are pretty hard so no, your probe would not pass through.... unless it was going REALLY fast (tachyon speed . . . and thats even faster than my Honda 125 ) and even then it would need to be really small and very hard.

Answer 7

Hi. That has already happened. A probe was sent into Jupiter's atmosphere and transmitted data until it was crushed. The core of Jupiter is most likely rock or iron, but the hydrogen is under so much pressure near the core that it is metallic!

Answer 8

Theoretically yes. But a probe would have to withstand EXTREME pressure to be able to enter the atmosphere. We do not yet have the technology to do it yet. You could try but the delicate instruments would be destroyed and there goes 150 million dollars down the drain. lol

Answer 9

More substantial than that I'm afraid, gaseous is a bit of a misleading phrase


Read this


A gas giant (sometimes also known as a Jovian planet after the planet Jupiter) is a large planet that is not primarily composed of rock or other solid matter. Gas giants may have a rocky or metallic core—in fact, such a core is thought to be required for a gas giant to form—but the majority of its mass is in the form of the gases hydrogen and helium, with traces of water, methane, ammonia, and other hydrogen compounds. (Although familiar to us as gases on Earth, these constituents are expected to be compressed into liquids or solids deep in a gas giant's atmosphere.)

Unlike rocky planets, which have a clearly defined difference between atmosphere and surface, gas giants do not have a well-defined surface; their atmospheres simply become gradually denser toward the core, perhaps with liquid or liquid-like states in between. One cannot "land on" such planets in the traditional sense. Thus, terms such as diameter, surface area, volume, surface temperature and surface density may refer only to the outermost layer visible from space.
From top: Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter (sizes not to scale).
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From top: Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter (sizes not to scale).

There are four gas giants in our solar system: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Uranus and Neptune may be considered as a separate subclass of giant planets, 'ice giants', or 'Uranian planets', as they are mostly composed of ice, rock and gas, unlike the "traditional" gas giants Jupiter or Saturn. However, they share the same qualities of the lack of the solid surface; their differences stem from the fact that their proportion of hydrogen and helium is lower, due to their greater distance from the Sun.

Answer 10

No, planets have cores, so only the surface is gaseous, if a space probe flew threw it, it might as well be a kamikazee