New images from NASA: the Juno spacecraft revealed images of Jupiter's volcanic moon
On December 30, during its 57th flyby of Jupiter, NASA's Juno spacecraft approached the planet's volcanic moon and captured detailed images of its surface. The spacecraft completed its mission in 2023 and came closer to Io than any other mission in the last 20 years.
According to Space.com, the spacecraft photographed Io from a distance of approximately 930 miles (1500 kilometers). It is noted that the last and only time NASA's Galileo spacecraft approached this largest volcanic body in the solar system was in 2001.
The Juno spacecraft launched towards Jupiter on August 5, 2011, and entered its system on July 4, 2016, covering a distance of 1.7 billion miles, or 2.8 billion kilometers. The objective of this mission is to observe and study volcanic changes on Io's moon.
"We're investigating how often they erupt, how bright and hot they are, how the shape of the lava flow changes, and how Io's activity is related to the flow of charged particles in Jupiter's magnetosphere," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator and researcher at the Southwest Research Institute.
It is noted that Io has earned the status of the largest volcanic body in the solar system due to the enormous gravity of Jupiter, the most massive planet in the solar system. This satellite is similar in size to the Moon and is covered with hundreds of volcanoes that spew lava to heights of tens of miles.
The NASA spacecraft will have the opportunity to approach the satellite several more times until it completes its mission in September 2025. Then, the spacecraft will intentionally crash into Jupiter's atmosphere, concluding its ninth and final mission.