On March 1, 2023, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew past Jupiter’s moon Io, at a distance of 51,500 kilometers (32,030 miles) from the deepest and third largest of the four Galilean moons.
This stunning new image provides the best and closest view of our solar system’s volcanic moons since the New Horizons mission flew through the Io system and Jupiter system in 2006 on its way to Pluto.
Cleary, Io still looks like pizza. The dappled and colorful surface stems from volcanic activity, with hundreds of holes and calderas on the surface creating various features.
Volcanic plumes and lava flows across the surface appear in a variety of colors, from red and yellow to orange and black. Some lava “rivers” span hundreds of kilometers.
In its extended mission, Juno has now orbited Jupiter 49 times, and is on its way to study several of Jupiter’s moons.
Io’s final flyby was the third of nine volcanic moonwalks the following year, marking the first flyby of a volcanic moon. December 2022.
Next year’s upcoming flyby on February 3, 2024 will come within 1,500 km (930 miles) of Io.
A montage of the five photos Io took @employeeJunoCAM instrument during PJ49 meeting on March 1, 2023.
Image credit: NASA/SwRI/MSSS/Jason Perry pic.twitter.com/o2G7DUASbd
– Jason Perry (volcano) March 4, 2023
Jason Perry, an Io monitoring expert who has worked with the Cassini, Galileo, and HiRISE imaging teams he said on Twitter A first look at these images shows some subtle changes from the New Horizons image.
“The surface changes are very small but there are at least two of them,” Perry wrote. “The first is a small stream from the east end of East Jirou. This is a [volcanic] Hotspot dulu New Horizons watched In the middle of a small explosion. Still active according to Juno Jerome.”
The Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) is a dual instrument consisting of an imager and a spectrograph using the same telescope.
Other data suggests the Choros Patera crater is bowl-shaped, Berry said. “The red material on Io indicates the presence of S3-S4, short-chain sulfur which must be replenished periodically through high-temperature volcanic activity,” he explained.
🧵1 / n
Io, a world around Jupiter a few hours agoFull size videos: https://t.co/QtOexIBOY9
Orbit (Peruv) 49@employee
Alternative: 64,994 to 52,515 km
Time: 01-03-2023
JNCE_2023060_49C00074>78#space #astronomy #Jupiter #Io
NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/AndreaLuck https://t.co/OPyD42aNzf pic.twitter.com/R7NYyhDaIA– Andrea Luck (@andrluck) March 4, 2023
The JunoCam is a high-resolution visible-light instrument, which is not actually part of the spacecraft’s main science payload.
Included in its mission as a public awareness camera, its images are being processed by members of the public, many of whom have been actively processing Juno’s images since its arrival at Jupiter in 2016.
However, with abundance JunoCam Images, It turns out that the photos are also used for science.
Image here from Andrea’s luckAnd Kevin M. Gill AII abbreviation Jason Perry.
Juno’s next encounter with Io will occur during Peregov 51 on May 16, 2023 at a distance of 35,000 km.
This article was originally published by the universe today. Reading Original article.
