The model Jupiter is the size of a marble, making it a giant in comparison to the planets of the inner solar system. Indeed, Jupiter is so different from the planets of the inner solar system that we must create an entirely new mental image of the term planet. Its mass is more than 300 times that of the Earth, and its volume is more than 1,000 times that of the Earth. Its most famous feature–a long-lived storm called the Great Red Spot–is itself large enough to swallow two or three Earths. Like the Sun, Jupiter is made primarily of hydrogen and helium and has no solid surface. If you plunged deep into Jupiter, you would be crushed by the increasing gas pressure long before you ever reached its core.

Jupiter reigns over many dozens of moons and a thin set of rings (too faint to be seen in most photographs). The four largest moons–Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto (often called the Galilean moons because they were discovered by Galileo)–are fascinating worlds in their own right and are easily visible on the scale of the model solar system. Io is the most volcanically active place in the solar system. Europa’s icy crust probably hides a subsurface ocean of liquid water, making Europa a promising place to search for life.

Note (for those on an actual tour of a Voyage model): You might be surprised to see the prominent rings surrounding Jupiter in the Voyage crystal. Jupiter really does have rings; in fact, all four of the giant planets (Jupiter Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) have rings. However, Jupiter’s rings are so thin and faint that they generally do not show up in visible light images (although they can be seen in images taken with infrared cameras like those on the James Webb Space Telescope). That said, the rings in the crystal are somewhat more prominent than Jupiter’s actual rings, because the methods used to make the crystals did not allow them to be made thinner. So the choice was either to leave out Jupiter’s rings or to show them somewhat exaggerated, and the Voyage team chose the latter option.