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There are new, high-quality images of Jupiter’s moon, Io, because of the closest flyby of the celestial physique by a spacecraft in many years.
NASA launched photos Saturday taken by the Juno spacecraft, which had been slated to fly roughly 930 miles from the floor of Io, the company mentioned.
The pictures of a silhouetted, dusty crimson sphere pockmarked by large grayish volcanoes prompted awe on-line amongst astronomers and different stargazers, a few of whom known as the pictures “magnificent” and “beautiful.”
The pictures had been captured by the JunoCam imager, a public engagement instrument that is able to taking visible-light shade photos, and which NASA says has been weakened by the consequences of radiation through the course of its mission.
Since 2016, Juno has been exploring Jupiter and its environment, together with Io, which is probably the most volcanic world within the photo voltaic system.
NASA investigators hope to make use of data gleaned from the flyby in addition to previous observations to study extra in regards to the tempestuous moon’s volcanoes.
“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,” Juno’s principal investigator Scott Bolton mentioned in an announcement.
The company has scheduled one other shut flyby of Io for Feb. 3, when Juno is once more anticipated to cross at about the identical distance from the moon’s floor because it did Saturday.
Juno’s mission is about to finish in late 2025.
NASA mentioned Juno’s transit previous Io over the weekend was the closest flyby since a similar flight by the company’s Galileo spacecraft in 2001, which got here inside about 112 miles of the volcanic moon.
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