What’s up, Europe? On Thursday, the NASA spacecraft Juno slid up close to Jupiter’s weird moon, giving back the closest-ever photographs of the frigid world. Since NASA’s Galileo spacecraft whizzed by Europa almost two decades ago, we haven’t had a decent look at it like this before.
The JunoCam website will soon be updated with raw photos from the flyby, taken by NASA. The initial pictures that have come in have a distinct yellowish-brown hue. One of the raw photographs was processed briefly by me to make it look more like Galileo’s observations. I trust the professionals in image processing to do justice to Juno’s new views of Europa.
NASA published an image of Europa taken by Juno from a mere 219 miles (352 kilometers) above the surface. Annwn Regio, a region close to the lunar equator, is depicted. The photograph brings out the craters and ridges on the moon.
When compared to our moon, Europa is slightly smaller. On Thursday, amateur astronomer Stuart Atkinson tweeted his impression of the big picture.
To determine if Europa’s surface features have altered over the past two decades, the Juno science team will compare the whole collection of photographs gathered by Juno with images from prior missions, as stated by Juno co-investigator Candy Hansen in a statement. The JunoCam imagery “will complete the current geologic map by replacing the area’s previous low-resolution coverage.”
The discovery of Europa is Juno’s newest accomplishment. It reached Jupiter in 2016, and its mission was extended in 2021 so that it may examine the planet’s largest moons in more depth. It has already explored Ganymede, and next year it will move on to Io. It took scientific measurements of Europa’s temperature, atmospheric composition, and visuals.
The future Europa Clipper mission will be sent by NASA to the moon. Europa is a promising candidate for habitability and the detection of microorganisms because it presumably conceals a salty subterranean liquid ocean underneath its ice shell. Moons have been observed to erupt unexplained geysers that may indicate subsurface activity.
While waiting for Europa Clipper to make its visit, Juno’s mission will help fill in some of the scientific gaps.
