NASA’s Juno spacecraft that has been orbiting the gas giant Jupiter has turned 10-years-old. Launched in 2011, the spacecraft was only intended to last till 2018, but its mission has now been extended until 2025.
During this decade, the spacecraft has unfurled many mysteries surrounding Jupiter, including geometric storms at the planet’s poles. The spacecraft has also snapped some mesmerizing images of the gas giant and has performed a propulsive maneuver to outrun an eclipse.
Celebrating in style
“Since launch, Juno has executed over 2 million commands, orbited Jupiter 35 times, and collected about three terabits of science data,” said Project Manager Ed Hirst of NASA’s JPL. “We are thrilled by our ongoing exploration of Jupiter, and there is much more to come. We have started our extended mission and look forward to 42 additional orbits to explore the Jovian system.”
To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Juno, the space agency shared a new image showing Jupiter’s icy moon Ganymede. The image was captured using the Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) instrument aboard the spacecraft. The instrument records in infrared wavelengths, showing features that aren’t captured in the visible light spectrum. The image helped astronomers to record data on the moon.
“Ganymede is larger than the planet Mercury, but just about everything we explore on this mission to Jupiter is on a monumental scale,” said Juno Principal Investigator Scott Bolton. “The infrared and other data collected by Juno during the flyby contain fundamental clues for understanding the evolution of Jupiter’s 79 moons from the time of their formation to today.”
Ganymede attracting astronomers
The solar system’s biggest moon has some intriguing features, such as being the only moon to have a magnetic field. It affects the flow of charged particles from the sun known as plasma, which in turn impacts the ice on Ganymede.
“We found Ganymede’s high latitudes dominated by water ice, with fine grain size, which is the result of the intense bombardment of charged particles,” said Alessandro Mura, a Juno co-investigator from the National Institute for Astrophysics in Rome. “Conversely, low latitudes are shielded by the moon’s magnetic field and contain more of its original chemical composition, most notably of non-water-ice constituents such as salts and organics. It is extremely important to characterize the unique properties of these icy regions to better understand the space-weathering processes that the surface undergoes.”
