Red Spot

American

noun

Astronomy.

a large, usually reddish gaseous vortex on the surface of Jupiter, about 14,000 by 30,000 km, that drifts about slowly as the planet rotates and has been observed for several hundred years.

Red Spot British

noun

See Great Red Spot

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of Red Spot

First recorded in 1875–80

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Given the intermittent historical observations of Jupiter's spots, scientists have long debated whether today's Great Red Spot is the same one 17th-century scientists saw.

From Science Daily • Jun. 19, 2024

You also most certainly think of the iconic Great Red Spot south of its equator.

From Salon • Dec. 26, 2022

Whiter areas on the planet represent regions with more cloud cover, which reflects sunlight, especially Jupiter's famous Great Red Spot; darker spots have fewer clouds.

From Scientific American • Dec. 20, 2022

The new observations, she added, “will allow us to study the interplay of dynamics, chemistry and temperature structure in and above the Great Red Spot and the auroral regions.”

From New York Times • Aug. 23, 2022

False color image of the Great Red Spot, in which the computer has exaggerated reds and blues at the expense of greens.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023