Striking NASA image reveals Io's volcano-laced surface - Fox News

NASA's Juno spacecraft's mission to Jupiter has acceptable its sights connected the satellite Io. 

The bureau said successful a release, sharing a striking representation of the moon's volcano-laced aboveground captured successful the infrared by the Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper this summer, that it was scheduled to representation the Jovian satellite connected Thursday. 

The Dec. 15 flyby was the archetypal of nine, with 2 of them conscionable 930 miles away. 

The July 5 photograph was captured arsenic the spacecraft flew by astatine a region of astir 50,000 miles, with brighter spots indicating wherever temperatures were higher.

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The volcano-laced aboveground of Jupiter’s satellite Io was captured successful infrared by the Juno spacecraft’s Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) imager arsenic it flew by astatine a region of was astir 50,000 miles (80,000 kilometers) connected July 5, 2022. Brighter spots bespeak higher temperatures successful this image.  (Image data: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/ASI/INAF/JIRAM)

"The squad is truly excited to person Juno’s extended ngo see the survey of Jupiter’s moons. With each adjacent flyby, we person been capable to get a wealthiness of caller information," Juno Principal Investigator Scott Bolton, of the Southwest Research Institute successful San Antonio, said successful a statement. "Juno sensors are designed to survey Jupiter, but we’ve been thrilled astatine however good they tin execute treble work by observing Jupiter’s moons."

Io, the astir volcanically progressive satellite successful the star system, will stay an entity of the Juno team’s attraction for the adjacent twelvemonth and a half. 

Now successful the 2nd twelvemonth of its ngo to analyse Jupiter's interior, the solar-powered Juno had antecedently performed adjacent flybys of Ganymede past twelvemonth and Europa earlier successful 2022.

This is the last presumption taken by the JunoCam instrumentality connected NASA's Juno spacecraft earlier Juno's instruments were powered down successful mentation for orbit insertion.  (Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS)

NASA said Juno scientists volition usage those flybys to execute the archetypal high-resolution monitoring run connected the magma-encrusted moon, studying Io’s volcanoes and however volcanic eruptions interact with Jupiter’s almighty magnetosphere and aurora.

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The satellite – which is simply a spot larger than Earth's satellite – has hundreds of volcanoes, immoderate erupting lava fountains dozens of miles high. 

En way to the icy worlds inhabiting the outer regions of our star system, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft zipped past Jupiter, catching Io, the planet’s third-largest moon, enduring a volcanic explosion.  (Image Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Cover representation courtesy of NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)

Its singular enactment is the effect of a tug-of-war betwixt Jupiter's almighty gravity and smaller but precisely timed pulls from Europa and Ganymede.

Io was discovered successful 1610 by famed Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei.

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The discovery, on with 3 different Jovian moons, was the archetypal clip a satellite was discovered orbiting a planet different than Earth.