The European Space Agency successfully launched its JUICE spacecraft to study Jupiter’s icy moons for potentially habitability.
The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer mission will visit three of Jupiter’s largest moons — Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto — to investigate whether they could be potentially habitable.The European Space Agency successfully launched its JUICE spacecraft to study Jupiter’s icy moons on Friday, April 14th.
“We have to launch on the second in order to have the right trajectory towards the first orbit around the Sun that will allow us to come back to Earth,” ESA payload system engineer Alessandro Atzei explained in a prelaunch briefing. This journey is designed to conserve as much fuel as possible, as the spacecraft will need its fuel reserves to perform maneuvers at Jupiter. Once JUICE arrives at Jupiter, it will perform a total of 35 flybys of Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto, the three icy moons.
The most intriguing feature of Ganymede, though, is that, like Europa and Callisto, it is thought to have a liquid water ocean beneath a crust of ice several miles thick. Evidence for this comes from the Galileo mission, which found perturbations of Jupiter’s magnetic field near Europa that suggested a subsurface ocean, plumes of water bursting through the surface detected by Hubble, and the detection of water vapor in Europa’s atmosphere made using ground-based telescopes.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
JUICE spacecraft launched to investigate the habitability of Jupiter’s icy moonsThe probe will study Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
Read more »
ESA's Juice is On Its Way to Visit Jupiter's MoonsA new era of exploration at Jupiter’s moons began last week with the launch of the European Space Agency’s Juice, the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer. This mission will visit three of Jupiter’s largest moons — Europa, Callisto and Ganymede — to investigate whether they could be potentially habitable, a question that’s been highly debated since … Continue reading 'ESA's Juice is On Its Way to Visit Jupiter's Moons'
Read more »
How To Make Tabitha Brown’s Famous Vegan ‘Deviled Eggs’ With Mushrooms and Pickle Juice'There are two things I miss being vegan: I miss seafood, and I miss a deviled egg,' she says. Brown shares how she came up with the unlikely combo—mushrooms and pickles—that turned out to be the secret recipe to making this deviled egg alternative as delicious as possible.
Read more »
Sloth visits Jupiter JUICE mission launch, becomes starA sloth was featured up front and center in ESA's live telecast of a historic Ariane 5 launch. Here's hoping the little guy was taken to safety before the rocket took off.
Read more »
JUICE Spacecraft Sends Farewell Photos of Earth as it Heads for JupiterThe mission will probe Jupiter's icy moons for signs of habitability, potentially providing clues as to the origins of life on other celestial bodies.
Read more »
What we bought: The Breville Juice Fountain Plus is a surprisingly useful jet engine | EngadgetThere's a tiny jet engine inside the Breville Juice Fountain Plus that extracts liquid from even the driest produce you throw at it..
Read more »