New Images Reveal Io’s Lava-Filled Surface: A Close-up Look at Jupiter’s Moon

NASA captured new images of Jupiter’s moon Io and its lava-filled surface.

In the images taken by the Juno probe, the surface of the moon appears covered in swirls of light and dark spots and large areas of molten red spots.

Dark red, magma-colored specks can be seen spread across the moon in detailed new images from Juno, which were processed by citizen scientists using raw data captured by the spacecraft.

Io is known to be home to hundreds of volcanoes that regularly erupt molten lava and spew plumes of sulfur gas hundreds of miles up into the atmosphere, which can be seen with large telescopes on Earth.