CLOUDS OF HIGH-CONTRAST ON URANUS

Near-infrared images of Uranus taken with the Hubble Space Telescope i n July and October 1997 revealed discrete clouds with contrasts exceed ing 10 times the highest contrast observed before with other technique s. At visible wavelengths, these 10 clouds had lower contrasts than cl ouds seen by Voyager 2 in 1986. Uranus' rotational rates for southern latitudes were identical in 1986 and 1997. Clouds in northern latitude s rotate slightly more slowly than clouds in opposite southern latitud es.