With its new expansion, Juno will visit the moons of Jupiter

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The Juno mission to Jupiter has been extended until September 2025 – or as long as the spacecraft can continue to operate around Jupiter.

While Juno has so far focused its attention on the one giant planet, the mission expansion will include observations of Jupiter’s rings and large moons, with focused sightings and planned close-up overflights of the moons Ganymede, Europa and Io.

These will be the first close flights of these moons since the Galileo mission in 1995-2003.

“One of the exciting things about the mission [extension]Juno principal investigator Scott Bolton said, speaking in September 2020 at a meeting of NASA’s Outer Planets Advisory Group, “are we going to go visit the satellites and the rings.” He’s really becoming a full system explorer, not as focused as the main mission was, so he’s potentially nurturing a more diverse community because the satellite geologists, the people in the ring will all be getting data that I think is very interesting and unique.

A multitude of gorgeous, swirling clouds in the northern dynamics of Jupiter’s North Temperate Belt are captured in this image of NASA’s Juno spacecraft. Several bright white “pop-up” clouds appear in the scene as well as a high pressure storm known as the white oval. Image Credit: Image enhanced by Gerald Eichstädt and Sean Doran (CC BY-NC-SA) / NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS

Juno made discoveries about Jupiter’s inner structure, magnetic field, and magnetosphere, and found its atmospheric dynamics to be far more complex than scientists previously thought. The onboard camera, the JunoCam, provided a stunning view of the world of the gas giant. Fans of space imagery expect JunoCam views of the Galilean moons to be nothing short of spectacular. Juno took long-range images of the Ganymede moon in 2020.

Juno arrived in Jupiter in July 2016, and the mission’s originally scheduled end date was February 2018, due to the spacecraft’s proximity to Jupiter and its radiation-laden environment. The harsh “working conditions” were expected to end up rendering the spacecraft unusable.

But the mission plan was changed when issues arose with the spacecraft’s main engine soon after Juno arrived in Jupiter. Originally, the spacecraft would have a 14-day close orbit around the planet. But at the end of 2016, mission directors opted not to burn a final rocket for that orbit due to uncertainty over the reliability of the engine.

Artist’s impression of Juno to Jupiter. Credit: NASA

Instead, a revised plan put Juno in a 53-day orbit. This meant that the whole mission was operating at a slower scientific pace. However, Bolton said that a slower pace was a “saving grace,” Juno was exposed to less severe radiation, allowing the mission to run longer than originally intended.

“I think the lesson is that we were flexible, and that’s good in missions,” Bolton said in September. “So when you design a mission, try to be flexible because you don’t know which curve ball you’re going to get thrown at.”

NASA also extended the InSight mission to Mars for two years, until December 2022. The spacecraft and the InSight team deployed and operated its highly sensitive seismometer, measuring earthquakes and collecting data on the robust tectonic activity on the Red Planet, as well as improving our knowledge of atmospheric dynamics, magnetic field and inner structure of the planet.

An independent review committee recommended the two mission extensions to NASA.

“The Senior Review has validated that these two planetary science missions will likely continue to bring new discoveries and generate new questions about our solar system,” said Lori Glaze, director of the planetary science division at NASA Headquarters. in Washington. “I thank the members of the lead review committee for their in-depth analysis and also thank the mission teams, who will now continue to provide exciting opportunities to refine our understanding of the dynamic science of Jupiter and Mars.

NASA says extended missions leverage large investments in those missions, allowing scientific operations to continue at a much lower cost than developing a new mission. “In some cases, extensions allow missions to continue to acquire valuable long-lasting data sets, while in other cases, they allow missions to visit new targets, with entirely new science goals,” he said. NASA said in a press release.

Caption of main image: Citizen scientist Kevin M. Gill created this image using data from the spacecraft’s JunoCam imager. Credits: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Kevin Gill.

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