Washington DC, 14 January 2024 (TDI): NASA’s Juno spacecraft has just made the closest flybys of Jupiter’s moon lo in more than 20 years. The Bureau of Global Public Affairs has its headquarters in Washington DC, USA.
The US Asia Pacific Media Hub has released a written statement that said, “High-resolution images and raw data of Jupiter’s moon lo are available for processing.”
On December 30th, 2023, NASA’s Juno spacecraft came within about 930 miles (1500 km) of the surface of the solar system. Moreover, it made a second ultra-close flyby of Lo just this week. The second pass went predominantly over the Southern hemisphere of Lo while previous flybys were over the Northern hemisphere.
Furthermore, evidence has been provided that explains active plumes, tall mountain peaks with well-defined shadows, and lava lakes with apparent islands.
NASA said that Juno had a similar close approach to the innermost Galilean moon previously in December 2023, where its closest pass came on its 58th circle of the massive planet. This helped the spacecraft to capture the first-ever images of the North and South poles of the moon lo.
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Reportedly, the spacecraft experienced radiation exposure during its latest pass of the planet which was doctored by engineers who used internal heaters on the camera to warm it up.
Lo is slightly larger than the Earth’s moon and features a surface temperature of negative 202 degrees. Its interior is warmed by the tidal forces of Jupiter’s gravitation field. In addition, the fueling volcanoes can exceed 3000 degrees.
NASA’s press release iterated that by combining data from this flyby and previous observations, the Juno science team is studying how Lo’s volcanoes vary. Moreover, to understand the tidal forces from Jupiter which are relentlessly squeezing this tortured moon.
Lastly, the aim is to observe the flow of charged particles in Jupiter’s magnetosphere.
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