On March 1, 2023, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew past Jupiter’s moon Io, approaching within 51,500 km of the third largest of the four moons.
Photos from open sources
Stunning new images provide the best view of the solar system’s most volcanic moon. The last time the New Horizons mission flew past Io and the Jupiter system was in 2006 on its way to Pluto.
The motley and colorful surface of Io was formed as a result of volcanic activity, on its surface there are hundreds of vents and calderas. Volcanic pillars and lava flows across the surface appear in all colors, from red and yellow to orange and black. Some of the “rivers” of lava stretch for hundreds of kilometers.
As part of its mission, Juno has already circled Jupiter 49 times and is on its way to explore several of Jupiter’s moons. This latest flyby of Io was the third of nine planned flybys of the volcanic moon this year, the first of which will take place in December 2022. The upcoming flyby next year on February 3, 2024 will approach Io at a distance of 1500 km.
Photos from open sources / Jupiter’s satellite Io, photographed by the Juno spacecraft on March 1, 2023 from a distance of 52,515 to 64,994 km / NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS
Io observational expert Jason Perry, who has worked with the imaging teams of Cassini, Galileo and HiRISE, tweeted that his first look at these images shows some changes from the New Horizons images.
“The surface changes are fairly minor, but there are at least two,” Perry wrote. “The first is a small stream from the eastern end of East Girru. This [вулканическая] a hotspot first seen by New Horizons in the midst of a mini-outbreak. She is still active.”
The Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) is a dual instrument consisting of a thermal imager and a spectrometer that share the same telescope.
Perry said other data show reddening of the bowl-shaped volcanic crater Chors Patera.
“The reddish material on Io indicates the presence of S3-S4, a short-chain sulfur that needs to be regularly renewed through active high-temperature volcanism,” he explained.
The JunoCam is a high-resolution visible light instrument that is not really part of the spacecraft’s main science load. She was included in the mission as a public awareness camera and her images are being processed by members of the public. However, thanks to the many JunoCam images, it turned out that these images were also used for scientific purposes.
Juno’s next encounter with Io will take place on May 16, 2023 at a distance of 35,000 km.
