The Galileo probe showed that Jupiter's atmosphere is severely depleted inneon compared to protosolar values. We show, via ab initio simulations of thepartitioning of neon between hydrogen and helium phases, that the observeddepletion can be explained by the sequestration of neon into helium-richdroplets within the postulated hydrogen-helium immiscibility layer of theplanet's interior. We also demonstrate that this mechanism will not affectargon, explaining the observed lack of depletion of this gas. This providesstrong indirect evidence for hydrogen-helium immiscibility in Jupiter.
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