NASA’s curious Jupiter probe is getting chummier with the planet’s most erratic moon, Io. The Juno spacecraft will perform the closest encounter any mission has had with the volcanic moon in over 20 years, gathering useful clues about its mysterious exercise.
Juno will make its flyby of Io on Saturday, December 30, coming inside 930 miles (1,500 kilometers) from the hellish floor of the Jovian moon, in line with NASA. The spacecraft has noticed Io throughout earlier flybys in Could and July from distances ranging between 6,830 miles (11,000 kilometers) to over 62,100 miles (100,000 kilometers). This upcoming flyby is a uncommon alternative to stand up shut and private with Io, essentially the most volcanically energetic physique within the photo voltaic system.
“By combining knowledge from this flyby with our earlier observations, the Juno science staff is learning how Io’s volcanoes differ,” Scott Bolton, Juno’s principal investigator, stated in a press release. “We’re searching for how typically they erupt, how vibrant and sizzling they’re, how the form of the lava circulation modifications, and the way Io’s exercise is related to the circulation of charged particles in Jupiter’s magnetosphere.”
Because the innermost of Jupiter’s massive moons, Io is wedged between Jupiter’s immense gravitational pressure, in addition to the gravitational tug of its sister moons Europa and Ganymede. In consequence, the moon is consistently being stretched and squeezed, which contributes to its volcanic exercise. The Jovian moon has lots of of volcanoes and lakes of molten silicate lava on its floor.
NASA’s Juno spacecraft has been learning the Jovian system since 2016, capturing some iconic photos of Jupiter and its icy moons Ganymede and Europa. In October, Juno captured an ominous view of Io, revealing its charred floor within the closest view of the moon to date. Juno additionally captured a comfy household photograph of Jupiter and Io in September, revealing the fuel large and its moon aspect by aspect.
Throughout its upcoming flyby of Io, the spacecraft will focus all of its three cameras on the small moon. The Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM), which takes photos in infrared, will acquire warmth signatures emitted by volcanoes on the moon’s floor, whereas the spacecraft’s Stellar Reference Unit (a navigational star digital camera) will seize the highest-resolution picture of Io’s floor ever taken. The JunoCam imager will take visible-light coloration photos of the moon.
Juno is scheduled for a second shut flyby of Io on February 3, 2024, by which the spacecraft will come inside about 930 miles (1,500 kilometers) of the moon’s floor. Throughout these upcoming flybys, scientists can have the chance to collect knowledge offered by Juno mixed with distant observations by the Hubble and Webb area telescopes.
“With our pair of shut flybys in December and February, Juno will examine the supply of Io’s large volcanic exercise, whether or not a magma ocean exists beneath its crust, and the significance of tidal forces from Jupiter, that are relentlessly squeezing this tortured moon,” Bolton stated.
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