NASA’s Juno to make closest ever flyby of Jupiter’s moon Io on Saturday

Washington: NASA’s Juno spacecraft is set to make the closest flyby of Jupiter’s moon Io that any spacecraft has made in over 20 years.

Juno will pass within roughly 1,500 kilometres from the surface of Io — the most volcanic world in our solar system — on Saturday.

“By combining data from this flyby with our previous observations, the Juno science team is studying how Io’s volcanoes vary,” said Juno’s principal investigator Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute in Texas, US.

“We are looking for how often they erupt, how bright and hot they are, how the shape of the lava flow changes, and how Io’s activity is connected to the flow of charged particles in Jupiter’s magnetosphere,” Bolton added.

Launched in August 2011, the spacecraft arrived at Jupiter in July 2016. The orbiter has so far performed 56 flybys of Jupiter and documented close encounters with three of the gas giant’s four largest moons.

A second ultra-close flyby of Io is scheduled for February 3, 2024, in which Juno will again come within about 1,500 kilometres of the surface.

The spacecraft has been monitoring Io’s volcanic activity from distances ranging from about 11,000 kilometres to over 100,000 kilometres, and has provided the first views of the moon’s north and south poles. The spacecraft has also performed close flybys of Jupiter’s icy moons Ganymede and Europa.

“With our pair of close flybys in December and February, Juno will investigate the source of Io’s massive volcanic activity, whether a magma ocean exists underneath its crust, and the importance of tidal forces from Jupiter, which are relentlessly squeezing this tortured moon,” said Bolton.

Now in the third year of its extended mission, with a total of 18 flyby’s, to investigate the origin of Jupiter, the solar-powered spacecraft will also explore the ring system where some of the gas giant’s inner moons reside.

After the close Io pass on February 3, the spacecraft will fly by Io every other orbit, with each orbit growing progressively more distant: The first will be at an altitude of about 16,500 kilometres above Io, and the last will be at about 115,000 kilometres.

The gravitational pull of Io on Juno during the December 30 flyby will reduce the spacecraft’s orbit around Jupiter from 38 days to 35 days. Juno’s orbit will drop to 33 days after the February 3 flyby.

After that, Juno’s new trajectory will result in Jupiter blocking the Sun from the spacecraft for about five minutes at the time when the orbiter is at its closest to the planet, a period called perijove.

Although this will be the first time the solar-powered spacecraft has encountered darkness since its flyby of Earth in October 2013, the duration will be too short to affect its overall operation.

With the exception of the February 3 perijove, the spacecraft will encounter solar eclipses like this during every close flyby of Jupiter from now on through the remainder of its extended mission, which ends in late 2025.

Starting in April 2024, the spacecraft will carry out a series of occultation experiments that use Juno’s Gravity Science experiment to probe Jupiter’s upper atmospheric makeup, which provides key information on the planet’s shape and interior structure.

IANS

North Korea sent 200 long-range artillery pieces to Russia, additional supply likely

Seoul: North Korea is estimated to have sent about 200 pieces of long-range artillery to Russia and is likely to send more troops and weapons in support of Moscow's war...

Macron’s Paris soiree brings together PM Modi, US V-P Vance

Paris: French President Emmanuel Macron greeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi with a friendly hug upon his arrival in Paris for a dinner at the Elysee Palace. Macron greeted Modi upon...

Communal social media post over AAP’s defeat stirs controversy in Mysuru; accused detained

Mysuru (Karnataka): Karnataka Police have detained one person in connection with a controversial social media post making communal comments against a particular community while celebrating the defeat of the Aam...

IICC chief Khurshid and Bihar MLA Iman address a grand India diaspora event in Riyadh

RIYADH: Senior Indian politician and Congress stalwart Salman Khurshid, former Minister of External Affairs, has lent his support to open several chapters of the India Islamic Cultural Center (IICC) in...

BJP’s notice to party’s veteran minister Anil Vij in Haryana

Chandigarh: Haryana’s senior-most minister and seven-time lawmaker Anil Vij was issued a show cause notice by the BJP on Monday for making public statements against the Chief Minister and the...

Foreign Affairs Advisor Hossain to meet EAM Jaishankar in Muscat: Bangladesh media reports

Dhaka :Touhid Hossain, the Foreign Affairs Advisor to the interim government in Bangladesh led by Muhammad Yunus, is expected to meet External Affairs Minister (EAM) S. Jaishankar on the sidelines...

2 pc rise in vote share a step forward: Cong on Delhi election defeat

New Delhi: Congress National Spokesperson Ragini Nayak on Monday acknowledged the party's underwhelming performance in the Delhi Assembly elections, where 67 of its 70 candidates lost their security deposits. However,...

Student from PM Modi’s constituency calls ‘Pariksha Pe Charcha’ an ‘unforgettable experience’

Varanasi: Students from across India participated in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's flagship event, 'Pariksha Pe Charcha' (PPC) 2025, expressing their excitement and appreciation for how the interaction helped them stay...

Trump says he will announce 25 pc duties on steel, aluminum imports; threatens more to come

New York: US President Donald Trump has said that he will announce a 25 per cent duty on all steel and aluminum imports, a long-standing contentious category of trade for...

No one has power to displace Palestinians: Turkish President

Istanbul: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that no one has the power to displace Palestinians from their homeland. "No one has the power to expel Gazans from their ancient...

Will rename Mustafabad to Shivpuri or Shiv Vihar: Delhi BJP MLA

New Delhi: The newly elected BJP MLA from Mustafabad, Mohan Singh Bisht, on Sunday said that the Assembly constituency would soon be renamed to Shivpuri or Shiv Vihar. He won...

Meta likely to lay off thousands of employees, says leaked memo

New Delhi: Tech giant Meta is expected to lay off around 3,000 employees, which is about 5 per cent of its total workforce, as per a leaked internal memo, reports...

Read Previous

IND v SA: Elgar’s 185, Jansen’s unbeaten fifty pushes South Africa into ascendancy against India

Read Next

Google Maps ‘Driving Mode’ on Android may shut in 2024

WP2Social Auto Publish Powered By : XYZScripts.com