NASA’s Juno Gets the Highest-Resolution Close-Up of Jupiter’s Moon Europa
The highest-resolution photo NASA’s Juno objective has ever taken of a specific portion of Jupiter’s moon Europa shows a detailed view of a puzzling region of the moon’s greatly fractured icy crust.
The picture covers about 93 miles (150 kilometers) by 125 miles (200 kilometres) of Europa’s surface, revealing an area crisscrossed with a network of fine grooves and double ridges (sets of long parallel lines showing elevated features in the ice).
Near the upper right of the image and just to the right and below center are dark stains, possibly connected to something from below emerging onto the surface. Below center and to the right is a surface feature that recalls one musical quarter note, measuring 42 miles (67 kilometers) north-south by twenty-three miles (37 kilometers) east-west. The white dots in the picture are signatures of penetrating high-power particles from the severe radiation environment around the moon.
Juno’s Stellar Reference Unit (SRU)– a star camera used to orient the spacecraft– acquired the black-and-white image throughout the spacecraft’s flyby of Europa on Sept. 29th, 2022, at a distance of about 256 miles (412 kilometres). With one resolution that ranges from 840 to 1,115 feet (256 to 340 metres) per pixel, the picture was captured as Juno raced past at around 15 miles per second (24 kilometres per 2nd) over a part of the surface that was in nighttime, dimly lit by “Jupiter shine”– sunlight reflecting off Jupiter’s cloud tops.
Designed for low-light conditions, the SRU has likewise proven itself a useful science device, discovering shallow lightning in Jupiter’s atmosphere, imaging Jupiter’s enigmatic ring system, and currently offering a glimpse of some of Europa’s most fascinating geologic formations.
” This image is opening an incredible level of information in an area not previously imaged at such resolution and under such showing illumination conditions,” stated Heidi Becker, the lead co-investigator for the SRU. “The group’s use of a star-tracker camera for science is a great example of Juno’s groundbreaking capabilities. These features are so intriguing. Understanding how they formed– and how they connect to Europa’s history– informs us about internal and external processes shaping the icy crust.”
It will not simply be Juno’s SRU researchers who will be busy analyzing information in the coming weeks. Throughout Juno’s 45th orbit around Jupiter, all of the spacecraft’s science instruments were collecting information both throughout the Europa flyby and then again as Juno flew over Jupiter’s poles a short 7 1/2 hours later.
“Juno started out completely focused on Jupiter. The group is really delighted that during our extended mission, we expanded our investigation to add three of the 4 Galilean satellites and Jupiter’s rings,” said Juno Principal Investigator Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. “With this flyby of Europa, Juno has currently seen close-ups of 2 of the most exciting moons of Jupiter, and also their ice shell crusts look extremely different from each other. In 2023, Io, the most volcanic body in the solar system, will join the club.” Juno sailed by Jupiter’s moon Ganymede– the solar system’s largest moon– in June 2021.
Europa is the solar system’s 6th-largest moon, with about ninety percent the equatorial size of Earth’s moon. Scientists are confident a salty sea lies below a miles-thick ice shell, sparking questions concerning the potential habitability of the sea. In the early 2030s, the NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft will arrive and also strive to answer these questions concerning Europa’s habitability. The information from the Juno flyby provides a preview of what that mission will reveal.
Read the original article on NASA.
