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Europa Jupiter System Missio
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Can there be life elsewhere?
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2/18/09
| Title |
Europa Jupiter System Mission |
| Date |
2/18/09 |
| Description |
Can there be life elsewhere? A proposed mission to Jupiter″_Ä_ës icy moons would explore Europa and Ganymede. |
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Jupiter's Moons
On Jan. 7, 1610, Galileo Gal
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01/08/10
| Description |
On Jan. 7, 1610, Galileo Galilei's improvements to the telescope enabled humanity to see Jupiter's four largest moons for the first time. Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto--the so-called Galilean satellites--were seen by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager on the New Horizons spacecraft during its flyby of Jupiter in late February 2007. The images have been scaled to represent the true relative sizes of the four moons and are arranged in their order from Jupiter. Io is notable for its active volcanism, which New Horizons studied extensively. On the other hand, Europa's smooth, icy surface likely conceals an ocean of liquid water. New Horizons obtained data on Europa's surface composition and imaged subtle surface features, and analysis of these data may provide new information about the ocean and the icy shell that covers it. New Horizons spied Ganymede from 2.2 million miles away. Ganymede, the largest moon in the solar system, has a dirty ice surface cut by fractures and peppered by impact craters. New Horizons' infrared observations may provide insight into the composition of the moon's surface and interior. Scientists are using the infrared spectra New Horizons gathered of Callisto's ancient, cratered surface to calibrate spectral analysis techniques that will help them to understand the surfaces of Pluto and its moon Charon when New Horizons passes them in 2015. Image Credit: NASA/JHU-APL/Southwest Research Institute |
| Date |
01/08/10 |
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Jupiter casts a baleful eye
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| Description |
Jupiter casts a baleful eye on wayward Ganymede in this frame, color-composited from narrow angle images taken on November 18 and high-pass filtered and contrast-enhanced to bring out details not readily seen otherwise. The smallest features in this image are 240 km across. Jupiter's `eye', the Great Red Spot, was captured just before disappearing over the eastern limb of the planet. The furrowed eyebrow above and to the left of the Spot is a turbulent wake region caused by westward flow deflected to the north and around the Red Spot. (An animation of ISS images from early October, beautifully illustrating this flow, was released on November 20 and can be viewed below.) Within the band south of the Red Spot are seen a trio of white ovals, small high pressure counter-clockwise rotating regions that are dynamically similar to the Red Spot. The dark filamentary features interspersed between the white ovals are probably cyclonic circulations, similar to those seen by Galileo, and, unlike the ovals, are rotating clockwise. Jupiter's Equatorial Zone stretching across the planet to the north of the Spot appears bright white, with gigantic plume clouds spreading out from the equator both to the northeast and to the southest. in a chevron pattern. This zone looks distinctly different than it did during the Voyager flyby 21 years ago when its color was predominantly brown, and only SW/NE-trending white plumes north of the equator were conspicous against the darker material beneath. The bluish gray regions near the equator, noted in earlier releases, are regions where the clouds have cleared and, except for partial obscuration by thin upper level hazes, we can see to great depth. The darker, brownish North Equatorial belt north of the Equatorial Zone is also quite turbulent. (See accompanying release below.) Ganymede is Jupiter's largest moon, about 50% larger than our own Moon and larger than the planet Mercury. Like the Moon and Mercury, Ganymede has no atmosphere, the visible details seen in this image are different geological terrains on the satellite's surface. Dark areas tend to be older and heavily cratered, the brighter locales are younger and more sparsely cratered. The latter are the famed grooved terrains first seen by Voyager and imaged at high resolution by Galileo. Cassini images of Ganymede and the other Galilean satellites taken near closest approach on December 30 will have resolutions of ~60 km/pixel, four times better than that seen here. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona # # # # # |
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Eyeing Ganymede
Jupiter casts a baleful eye
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12/5/00
| Date |
12/5/00 |
| Description |
Jupiter casts a baleful eye toward the moon Ganymede in this enhanced-contrast image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft. Jupiter's `eye', the Great Red Spot, was captured just before disappearing around the eastern edge of the planet. The furrowed eyebrow above and to the left of the spot is a turbulent wake region caused by westward flow that has been deflected to the north and around the Red Spot. The smallest features visible are about 240 kilometers (150 miles) across. Within the band south of the Red Spot are a trio of white ovals, high pressure counterclockwise-rotating regions that are dynamically similar to the Red Spot. The dark filamentary features interspersed between white ovals are probably cyclonic circulations and, unlike the ovals, are rotating clockwise. Jupiter's equatorial zone stretching across the planet north of the Spot appears bright white, with gigantic plume clouds spreading out from the equator both to the northeast and to the southeast in a chevron pattern. This zone looks distinctly different than it did during the Voyager flyby 21 years ago. Then, its color was predominantly brown and the only white plumes conspicuous against the darker material beneath them were oriented southwest-to-northeast. Ganymede is Jupiter's largest moon, about 50 percent larger than our own Moon and larger than the planet Mercury. The visible details in this image are different geological terrains. Dark areas tend to be older and heavily cratered, brighter areas are younger and less cratered. Cassini images of Ganymede and Jupiter's other large moons taken near closest approach on Dec. 30 will have resolutions about four times better than that seen here. This image is a color composite of ones taken with different filters by Cassini's narrow-angle camera on Nov. 18, 2000, processed to enhance contrast. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona # # # # # |
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Jupiter's Inner Satellites a
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This schematic cut-away view
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9/15/98
| Date |
9/15/98 |
| Description |
This schematic cut-away view of the components of Jupiter's ring system shows the geometry of the rings in relation to Jupiter and to the small inner satellites, which are the source of the dust that forms the rings. The innermost and thickest ring, shown in gray shading, is the halo that ends at the main ring. The thin, narrow main ring, shown with red shading, is bounded by the 16-kilometer-wide (10-miles) satellite Adrastea and shows a marked decrease in brightness near the orbit of Jupiter's innermost moon, Metis. It is composed of fine particles knocked off Adrastea and Metis. Although the orbits of Adrastea and Metis are about 1,000 kilometers (about 600 miles) apart, that separation is not depicted in this drawing. Impacts by small meteoroids (fragments of asteroids and comets) into these small, low- gravity satellites feed material into the rings. Thebe and Amalthea, the next two satellites in increasing distance from Jupiter, supply dust which forms the thicker, disk-like "gossamer" rings. The gossamer rings, depicted with yellow and green shading, are thicker because the source satellites orbit Jupiter on inclined paths These small satellites all orbit closer to Jupiter than the four largest "Galilean" satellites, Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, which were discovered nearly 400 years ago. The orbital distances of the moons are drawn relative to the size of Jupiter. The Jupiter image was created from a map based on data obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope. JPL manages the Galileo mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. The images are posted on the Internet at http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/ and at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo . Background information and educational context for the images can be found at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/sepo . ##### 9/10/98 JP |
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Jupiter and Europa in Near I
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These two images, taken by N
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11/6/00
| Date |
11/6/00 |
| Description |
These two images, taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, show Jupiter in a near-infrared wavelength, and catch Europa, one of Jupiter's largest moons, at different phases. Cassini's narrow-angle camera took both images, the upper one from a distance of 69.9 million kilometers (43.4 million miles) on Oct. 17, 2000, and the lower one from a distance of 65.1 million kilometers (40.4 million miles) on Oct. 22, 2000. Both were taken at a wavelength of 727 nanometers, which is in the near-infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The camera's 727-nanometer filter accepts only a narrow spectral range centered on a relatively strong absorption feature due to methane gas. In this spectral region, the amount of light reflected by Jupiter's clouds is only half that reflected in a nearby spectral region outside the methane band. The features that are brightest in these images are the highest and thickest clouds, such as the Great Red Spot and the band of clouds girding the equator, as these scatter sunlight back to space before it has a chance to be absorbed by the methane gas in the atmosphere. This stratigraphic effect can be seen even more prominently in an image released on Oct. 23, 2000, taken in the stronger methane band at 889 nanometers, in which the only bright features are the highest hazes over the equator, the poles and the Great Red Spot. By comparing images taken in the 727 nanometer filter with others taken at 889 nanometers and at a weaker methane band at 619 nanometers, researchers will probe the heights and thickness of clouds in Jupiter's atmosphere. Europa, a satellite of Jupiter about the size of Earth's Moon, is visible to the left of Jupiter in the upper image, and in front of the planet in the lower image. Another of Jupiter's Galilean satellites, Ganymede, which is larger than the planet Mercury, is to the right in the upper image, with brightness variations visible across its surface. In the upper image, Europa is caught entering Jupiter's shadow, and hence appears as a bright crescent, in the lower image, it is seen about one-and-a-half orbits later, in transit across the face of the planet. Because there is neither methane nor any strong absorber in this spectral region on the surface of Europa, it appears strikingly white and bright compared to Jupiter. Imaging observations of the moons Europa, Io and Ganymede entering and passing through Jupiter's shadow are planned for the two-week period surrounding Cassini's closest approach on Dec. 30, 2000. The purpose of these eclipse observations is to detect and measure the variability of emissions that arise from the interaction of the satellites' tenuous atmospheres with the charged particles trapped in Jupiter's magnetic field. At the times these images were taken, Cassini was about 3.3 degrees above Jupiter's equatorial plane, and the Sun-Jupiter- spacecraft angle was about 20 degrees. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona ##### |
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| Description |
Eye on Ganymede |
| Full Description |
Jupiter casts a baleful eye toward the moon Ganymede in this enhanced-contrast image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft. Jupiter's 'eye', the Great Red Spot, was captured just before disappearing around the eastern edge of the planet. The furrowed eyebrow above and to the left of the spot is a turbulent wake region caused by westward flow that has been deflected to the north and around the Red Spot. The smallest features visible are about 240 kilometers (150 miles) across. Within the band south of the Red Spot are a trio of white ovals, high pressure counterclockwise-rotating regions that are dynamically similar to the Red Spot. The dark filamentary features interspersed between white ovals are probably cyclonic circulations and, unlike the ovals, are rotating clockwise. Jupiter's equatorial zone stretching across the planet north of the Spot appears bright white, with gigantic plume clouds spreading out from the equator both to the northeast and to the southeast in a chevron pattern. This zone looks distinctly different than it did during the Voyager flyby 21 years ago. Then, its color was predominantly brown and the only white plumes conspicuous against the darker material beneath them were oriented southwest-to-northeast. Ganymede is Jupiter's largest moon, about 50 percent larger than our own Moon and larger than the planet Mercury. The visible details in this image are different geological terrains. Dark areas tend to be older and heavily cratered, brighter areas are younger and less cratered. Cassini images of Ganymede and Jupiter's other large moons taken near closest approach on Dec. 30 will have resolutions about four times better than that seen here. This image is a color composite of ones taken with different filters by Cassini's narrow-angle camera on Nov. 18, 2000, processed to enhance contrast. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona For higher resolution, click here. |
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| Description |
Here on the Gallery page you can find the very latest images, videos and products from the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn, including the spectacular launch, spacecraft assembly and the exciting trip to Saturn. |
| Full Description |
The solar system's largest moon, Ganymede, is captured here alongside the planet Jupiter in a color picture taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on Dec. 3, 2000. Ganymede is larger than the planets Mercury and Pluto and Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Both Ganymede and Titan have greater surface area than the entire Eurasian continent on our planet. Cassini was 26.5 million kilometers (16.5 million miles) from Ganymede when this image was taken. The smallest visible features are about 160 kilometers (about 100 miles) across. The bright area near the south (bottom) of Ganymede is Osiris, a large, relatively new crater surrounded by bright icy material ejected by the impact which created it. Elsewhere, Ganymede displays dark terrains that NASA's Voyager and Galileo spacecraft have shown to be old and heavily cratered. The brighter terrains are younger and laced by grooves. Various kinds of grooved terrains have been seen on many icy moons in the solar system. These are believed to be the surface expressions of warm, pristine, water-rich materials that moved to the surface and froze. Ganymede has proven to be a fascinating world, the only moon known to have a magnetosphere, or magnetic environment, produced by a convecting metal core. The interaction of Ganymede's and Jupiter's magnetospheres may produce dazzling variations in the auroral glows in Ganymede's tenuous atmosphere of oxygen. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona For higher resolution, click here. |
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Transition on Enceladus
| Description |
Transition on Enceladus |
| Full Description |
This view of Saturn's moon Enceladus shows an area that has undergone a very intriguing -- and in places puzzling -- sequence of events. The craters here are subdued, as seen elsewhere on Enceladus, and most, but not all, are older than the fractures. Fracturing has occurred at a wide variety of scales, from the wide rift running through the center of the image to much narrower sets of shorter fractures that crosscut the craters (and each other) to the left. The image has been rotated so that north on Enceladus is up. This region is a transition from cratered to wrinkled terrain. Westward (left) of the central rift that divides the two regions are relatively parallel grooves and ridges that are reminiscent of terrain on Jupiter's large moon Ganymede. Very few craters are seen in this area of Enceladus. Eastward (right) of the large rift the terrain becomes more cratered, although the craters are quite degraded (meaning soft and shallow in appearance). A prominent fracture runs north-south to the center of the image, then turns sharply to the southwest, cutting across cratered terrain, the large rift, and the grooved terrain. This behavior signifies that it is one of the youngest features in this image. The image was taken in visible light with the narrow angle camera from a distance of about 14,000 kilometers (8,800 miles) and from Enceladus and at a Sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 44 degrees. Pixel scale in the image is about 85 meters (280 feet) per pixel. A stereo anaglyph version of the scene is also available (see Transition on Enceladus (3-D)). The images have been contrast-enhanced to aid visibility. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov . For additional images visit the Cassini imaging team homepage http://ciclops.org . *Credit:* NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute |
| Date |
March 24, 2005 |
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Transition on Enceladus (3-D
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| Description |
Transition on Enceladus (3-D) |
| Full Description |
This stereo anaglyph of Saturn's moon Enceladus shows an area that has undergone a very intriguing -- and in places puzzling -- sequence of events. The craters here are subdued, as seen elsewhere on Enceladus, and most, but not all, are older than the fractures. Fracturing has occurred at a wide variety of scales, from the wide rift running through the center of the image to much narrower sets of shorter fractures that crosscut the craters (and each other) to the left. The anaglyph has been rotated so that north on Enceladus is up. This region is a transition from cratered to wrinkled terrain. Westward (left) of the central rift that divides the two regions are relatively parallel grooves and ridges that are reminiscent of terrain on Jupiter's large moon Ganymede. Very few craters are seen in this area of Enceladus. Eastward (right) of the large rift the terrain becomes more cratered, although the craters are quite degraded (meaning soft and shallow in appearance). A prominent fracture runs north-south to the center of the image, then turns sharply to the southwest, cutting across cratered terrain, the large rift, and the grooved terrain. This behavior signifies that it is one of the youngest features in this image. The images for this anaglyph were taken in visible light with Cassini's narrow-angle camera, at distances from Enceladus ranging from about 25,700 kilometers (16,000 miles, red-colored image) to 14,000 kilometers (8,800 miles, blue-colored image) and at a Sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle ranging from 46 to 44 degrees. Pixel scale in the red image was 150 meters (490 feet) per pixel. Scale in the blue image was 85 meters (280 feet) per pixel. A separate, non-stereo version of the scene, showing only the red image, is also available (see Transition on Enceladus (3-D)). The images have been contrast-enhanced to aid visibility. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov . For additional images visit the Cassini imaging team homepage http://ciclops.org . *Credit:* NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute |
| Date |
March 24, 2005 |
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| Description |
Here on the Gallery page you can find the very latest images, videos and products from the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn, including the spectacular launch, spacecraft assembly and the exciting trip to Saturn. |
| Full Description |
Auroral "Footprints" of Jupiter's Moons February 27, 2002 A drawing illustrates how flows of electrons steered by Jupiter's magnetic field connect three of Jupiter's large moons with the upper atmosphere near Jupiter's north and south poles. The currents stimulate ultraviolet aurora glows in Jupiter's upper atmosphere. Observations with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, coordinated with the late 2000 flyby of Jupiter by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, captured those auroral footprints for the moons Io (left), Europa (right) and Ganymede (center). In the illustration, Jupiter's magnetic field lines are presented in blue, the moons' orbital paths around Jupiter in yellow. Pink loops from each of the moons to Jupiter's poles depict the flux tubes that are the paths of powerful electric currents. The Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md., manages space operations for Hubble for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The institute is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., for NASA, under contract with the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science. Credit: NASA/John Spencer, Lowell Observatory and John Clarke, Boston University More information about the Cassini and Galileo joint observations of the Jupiter system is available online at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/jupiterflyby. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Galileo and Cassini missions for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. |
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Map of Titan in Infrared
| Description |
Mosaic of Titan obtained at the 2.03 micron wavelength |
| Full Description |
On Oct. 26, 2004, the Cassini spacecraft flew over Saturn's moon Titan at less than 1,200 kilometers (746 miles) at closest approach. Cassini acquired several infrared images with spatial resolution ranging from a few tens of kilometers (several miles) to 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) per pixel. The visual and infrared mapping spectrometer instrument took images from visible wavelengths to the 5.1 micron wavelength. This figure shows the mosaic obtained at the 2.03 micron wavelength. Observations are centered on the hemisphere of Titan that points away from Saturn. The left (inset) high-resolution image is 30 kilometers (19 miles) per pixel. It shows the site where the European Space Agency's Huygens probe successfully landed on Jan. 14, 2005. The right inset shows a circular feature that scientists think is a volcano, which may be responsible for replenishing Titan's methane atmosphere. Titan¿s diameter is 5,151 kilometers (3,200 miles), which is larger than Jupiter's moon Callisto and smaller than another Jovian moon, Ganymede. Callisto has a diameter of 4,806 kilometers (2,986 miles) and Ganymede is 5,268 kilometers (3,273 miles). The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The visual and infrared mapping spectrometer team is based at the University of Arizona. For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov . The visual and infrared mapping spectrometer team homepage is at http://wwwvims.lpl.arizona.edu . Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona |
| Date |
June 8, 2005 |
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One View, Multiple Worlds
| Description |
One View, Multiple Worlds: Tethys, Epimetheus and Titan |
| Full Description |
Three very different worlds crowd the frame in this unique view from the Cassini spacecraft, which although partly overexposed, provides a splendid look at several major targets of interest for the mission. Titan (at the top) has a thick, hazy atmosphere. Cassini has observed it to be a world where complex geological and atmospheric processes are occurring. At 5,150 kilometers (3,200 miles) across, it is Saturn's largest moon, and is the second largest moon in the solar system, after Jupiter's moon Ganymede (5,262 kilometers, or 3,270 miles across). Tethys (at the bottom) has been battered by impacts over the eons, and some of its many craters are visible in this image. Tethys (1,071 kilometers, or 665 miles across) is one of Saturn's major icy moons, having a density close to that of water. This moon shows evidence that icy tectonic processes have occurred on its frozen surface, such as the immense canyon system called Ithaca Chasma. Epimetheus (center) is one of Saturn's "ring moons": small, porous bodies that orbit within or just beyond the rings. Cassini acquired the closest-ever view of cratered Epimetheus (116 kilometers, or 72 miles across) in March, 2005. Also near center are Saturn's F ring and the outer edge of the A ring to the left. In addition to the F ring's usually bright core, several other ringlets are resolved here, giving the ring a soft, wispy character that shows contrast with the more sharply defined A ring. Appearances can be deceiving in two dimensional images like this one where it is difficult to tell which objects are in the foreground and which are farther away. In this scene, Tethys is the closest object to Cassini, at 1.2 million kilometers (700,000 miles) away. Epimetheus is on the near side of the rings and is 1.4 million kilometers (900,000 miles) distant. The giant moon Titan is 2.7 million kilometers (1.7 million miles) away, more than twice as far from Cassini as Tethys. This view is a mosaic of two images taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Feb. 19, 2005. The image scale in the scene ranges from 16 kilometers (10 miles) per pixel on Titan to 7 kilometers (4 miles) per pixel on Tethys. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov . The Cassini imaging team homepage is at http://ciclops.org . Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute |
| Date |
June 9, 2005 |
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The Face of Phoebe
| Description |
The Face of Phoebe |
| Full Description |
Phoebe's true nature is revealed in startling clarity in this mosaic of two images taken during Cassini's flyby on June 11, 2004. The image shows evidence for the emerging view that Phoebe may be an ice-rich body coated with a thin layer of dark material. Small bright craters in the image are probably fairly young features. This phenomenon has been observed on other icy satellites, such as Ganymede at Jupiter. When impactors slammed into the surface of Phoebe, the collisions excavated fresh, bright material -- probably ice -- underlying the surface layer. Further evidence for this can be seen on some crater walls where the darker material appears to have slid downwards, exposing more light-colored material. Some areas of the image that are particularly bright - especially near lower right - are over-exposed. An accurate determination of Phoebe's density - a forthcoming result from the flyby - will help Cassini mission scientists understand how much of the little moon is comprised of ices. This spectacular view was obtained at a phase, or Sun-Phoebe-spacecraft, angle of 84 degrees, and from a distance of approximately 32,500 kilometers (20,200 miles). The image scale is approximately 190 meters (624 feet) per pixel. No enhancement was performed on this image. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit, http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and the Cassini imaging team home page, http://ciclops.org . Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute |
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| Description |
Titan's Relative Size |
| Full Description |
Terrestrial planets (shown in the top row) are compared with the Solar System's largest satellites. Titan is the second-largest satellite in the solar system. Only Jupiter¿s satellite Ganymede is larger in diameter. Titan is actually larger than the planet Mercury and is almost as large as Mars. For higher resolution, click here. |
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| Description |
Here on the Gallery page you can find the very latest images, videos and products from the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn, including the spectacular launch, spacecraft assembly and the exciting trip to Saturn. |
| Full Description |
Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona (PIA02826) For higher resolution, click here., These two images, taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, show Jupiter in a near-infrared wavelength, and catch Europa, one of Jupiter's largest moons, at different phases. Cassini's narrow-angle camera took both images, the upper one from a distance of 69.9 million kilometers (43.4 million miles) on Oct. 17, 2000, and the lower one from a distance of 65.1 million kilometers (40.4 million miles) on Oct. 22, 2000. Both were taken at a wavelength of 727 nanometers, which is in the near-infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The camera's 727-nanometer filter accepts only a narrow spectral range centered on a relatively strong absorption feature due to methane gas. In this spectral region, the amount of light reflected by Jupiter's clouds is only half that reflected in a nearby spectral region outside the methane band. The features that are brightest in these images are the highest and thickest clouds, such as the Great Red Spot and the band of clouds girding the equator, as these scatter sunlight back to space before it has a chance to be absorbed by the methane gas in the atmosphere. This stratigraphic effect can be seen even more prominently in an image released on Oct. 23, 2000, taken in the stronger methane band at 889 nanometers, in which the only bright features are the highest hazes over the equator, the poles and the Great Red Spot. By comparing images taken in the 727 nanometer filter with others taken at 889 nanometers and at a weaker methane band at 619 nanometers, researchers will probe the heights and thickness of clouds in Jupiter's atmosphere. Europa, a satellite of Jupiter about the size of Earth's Moon, is visible to the left of Jupiter in the upper image, and in front of the planet in the lower image. Another of Jupiter's Galilean satellites, Ganymede, which is larger than the planet Mercury, is to the right in the upper image, with brightness variations visible across its surface. In the upper image, Europa is caught entering Jupiter's shadow, and hence appears as a bright crescent, in the lower image, it is seen about one-and-a-half orbits later, in transit across the face of the planet. Because there is neither methane nor any strong absorber in this spectral region on the surface of Europa, it appears strikingly white and bright compared to Jupiter. Imaging observations of the moons Europa, Io and Ganymede entering and passing through Jupiter's shadow are planned for the two-week period surrounding Cassini's closest approach on Dec. 30, 2000. The purpose of these eclipse observations is to detect and measure the variability of emissions that arise from the interaction of the satellites' tenuous atmospheres with the charged particles trapped in Jupiter's magnetic field. At the times these images were taken, Cassini was about 3.3 degrees above Jupiter's equatorial plane, and the Sun-Jupiter-spacecraft angle was about 20 degrees. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian |
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The Face of Phoebe
| title |
The Face of Phoebe |
| date |
06.11.2004 |
| description |
Phoebe's true nature is revealed in startling clarity in this mosaic of two images taken during Cassini's flyby on June 11, 2004. The image shows evidence for the emerging view that Phoebe may be an ice-rich body coated with a thin layer of dark material. Small bright craters in the image are probably fairly young features. This phenomenon has been observed on other icy satellites, such as Ganymede at Jupiter. When impactors slammed into the surface of Phoebe, the collisions excavated fresh, bright material -- probably ice -- underlying the surface layer. Further evidence for this can be seen on some crater walls where the darker material appears to have slid downwards, exposing more light-colored material. Some areas of the image that are particularly bright - especially near lower right - are over-exposed. An accurate determination of Phoebe's density -- a forthcoming result from the flyby -- will help Cassini mission scientists understand how much of the little moon is comprised of ices. This spectacular view was obtained at a phase, or Sun-Phoebe-spacecraft, angle of 84 degrees, and from a distance of approximately 32,500 kilometers (20,200 miles). The image scale is approximately 190 meters (624 feet) per pixel. No enhancement was performed on this image. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras, were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. For more information, about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit, http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov [ http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/ ] and the Cassini imaging team home page, http://ciclops.org [ http://ciclops.org/ ]. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute |
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Moons of the Solar System
| title |
Moons of the Solar System |
| description |
All the planetary moons in our solar system are shown here at their correct relative size and true color. Their diversity of size and appearance is testament to the unique and fascinating geologic history that each of these bodies has undergone. Two of the moons are larger than the planet Mercury, and eight of them are larger than Pluto. Earth's Moon is the fifth largest of the set, with a diameter of 3476 kilometers (2160 miles). Most of the moons are thought to have formed from a disk of debris left over from formation of the planet they orbit. However Triton, Neptune's largest moon, and several of the smallest moons, including the moons of Mars, are thought to be captured planetesimals that formed elsewhere in the solar system. Earth's Moon is thought to have formed from the debris ejected from a roughly Mars-sized object colliding with the early Earth, perhaps a unique event in the history of the solar system. The moons are organized on the diagram by the planet they orbit (top to bottom with increasing distance from the Sun) and their position relative to the planet (left to right with increasing distance from the planet). Below is a listing of the names of all the moons and the planets they orbit. Most moons are named for mythological characters associated with the character the planet is named for. While most of the planets are named for Roman characters (with the exceptions of Pluto and Uranus), most of the moon have names from Greek mythology. For example, Phobos and Deimos are the sons of Ares, the Greek version of Mars. Jupiter?s moons are all named for lovers and other close associates of Zeus (Jupiter). Saturn?s moons are named for Titans, the race that included Cronos (Saturn), Zeus? father. Neptune?s moons are named for mythological characters associated with water, and Charon was the ferryman of the dead who brought people to Pluto?s realm. By tradition, the discoverer of a moon gets to name it (now subject to approval by the International Astronomical Union). The son of the discoverer of the first two moons of Uranus (Sir William Herschel) decided to name Uranus? moons not for mythological characters, but instead for the king and queen of fairies in Shakespear?s A Midsummer Night?s Dream . This began a tradition whereby all uranian satellites are named for fairy characters in English drama. To read more about the names of the planets and their satellites, go to the U.S. Geological Survey?s nomenclature guide at http://wwwflag.wr.usgs.gov/USGSFlag/Space/nomen/append7.html . *Earth* Moon *Mars * Phobos, Deimos *Jupiter* Metis, Adrastea, Amalthea, Thebe, Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto, Leda, Himalia, Lysithea, Elara, Ananke, Carme, Pasiphae, Sinope *Saturn * Pan, Atlas, Prometheus, Pandora, Epimetheus, Janus, Mimas, Enceladus, Tethys, Calypso, Telesto, Dione, Helene, Rhea, Titan, Hyperion, Iapetus, Phoebe *Uranus * Cordelia, Ophelia, Bianca, Cressida, Desdemona, Juliet, Portia, Rosalind, Belinda, Puck, Miranda,, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, Oberon *Neptune* Naiad, Thalassa, Despina, Galatea, Larissa, Proteus, Triton, Nereid *Pluto * Charon *Image Credit*: Image processing by Tim Parker (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) and Paul Schenk and Robert Herrick (Lunar and Planetary Institute), based on NASA images. |
|
Jupiter Aurora
| title |
Jupiter Aurora |
| description |
In this Hubble telescope picture, a curtain of glowing gas is wrapped around Jupiter's north pole like a lasso. This curtain of light, called an aurora, is produced when high-energy electrons race along the planet's magnetic field and into the upper atmosphere where they excite atmospheric gases, causing them to glow. The aurora resembles the same phenomenon that crowns Earth's polar regions. But this Hubble image, taken in ultraviolet light, also shows the glowing "footprints" of three of Jupiter's largest moons: Io, Ganymede, and Europa. Spanning next two months in 2004, Jupiter's aurora will be scrutinized by two observatories: the Hubble telescope and the Cassini spacecraft, which will fly by the planet on its voyage to Saturn. *Image Credit*: John Clarke (University of Michigan) and NASA |
|
Ganymede's Shadow
| title |
Ganymede's Shadow |
| date |
01.09.2007 |
| description |
The New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) took this photo of Jupiter at 20:42:01 UTC on January 9, 2007, when the spacecraft was 80 million kilometers (49.6 million miles) from the giant planet. The volcanic moon Io is to the left of the planet, the shadow of the icy moon Ganymede moves across Jupiter's northern hemisphere. Ganymede's average orbit distance from Jupiter is about 1 million kilometers (620,000 miles), Io's is 422,000 kilometers (262,000 miles). Both Io and Ganymede are larger than Earth's moon, Ganymede is larger than the planet Mercury. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
|
Moons around Jupiter
| title |
Moons around Jupiter |
| date |
01.09.2007 |
| description |
The New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) took this photo of Jupiter at 20:42:01 UTC on January 9, 2007, when the spacecraft was 80 million kilometers (49.6 million miles) from the giant planet. The volcanic moon Io is to the left of the planet, the shadow of the icy moon Ganymede moves across Jupiter's northern hemisphere. Ganymede's average orbit distance from Jupiter is about 1 million kilometers (620,000 miles), Io's is 422,000 kilometers (262,000 miles). Both Io and Ganymede are larger than Earth's moon, Ganymede is larger than the planet Mercury. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
|
Ganymede
| title |
Ganymede |
| date |
02.27.2007 |
| description |
This is New Horizons' best image of Ganymede, Jupiter's largest moon, taken with the spacecraft's Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) camera at 10:01 Universal Time on February 27 from a range of 3.5 million kilometers (2.2 million miles). The longitude of the disk center is 38 degrees West and the image scale is 17 kilometers (11 miles) per pixel. Dark patches of ancient terrain are broken up by swaths of brighter, younger material, and the entire icy surface is peppered by more recent impact craters that have splashed fresh, bright ice across the surface. With a diameter of 5,268 kilometers (3.273 miles), Ganymede is the largest satellite in the solar system. This is one of a handful of Jupiter system images already returned by New Horizons during its close approach to Jupiter. Most of the data being gathered by the spacecraft are stored onboard and will be downlinked to Earth during March and April 2007. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
|
Io and Ganymede
| title |
Io and Ganymede |
| date |
01.17.2007 |
| description |
The New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) took this 4-millisecond exposure of Jupiter and two of its moons at 01:41:04 UTC on January 17, 2007. The spacecraft was 68.5 million kilometers (42.5 million miles) from Jupiter, closing in on the giant planet at 41,500 miles (66,790 kilometers) per hour. The volcanic moon Io is the closest planet to the right of Jupiter, the icy moon Ganymede is to Io's right. The shadows of each satellite are visible atop Jupiter's clouds, Ganymede's shadow is draped over Jupiter's northwestern limb. Ganymede's average orbit distance from Jupiter is about 1.07 million kilometers (620,000 miles), Io's is 422,000 kilometers (262,000 miles). Both Io and Ganymede are larger than Earth's moon, Ganymede is larger than the planet Mercury. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
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Storms and Moons
| title |
Storms and Moons |
| date |
01.24.2007 |
| description |
The New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) took this 2-millisecond exposure of Jupiter at 04:41:04 UTC on January 24, 2007. The spacecraft was 57 million kilometers (35.3 million miles) from Jupiter, closing in on the giant planet at 41,500 miles (66,790 kilometers) per hour. At right are the moons Io (bottom) and Ganymede, Ganymede's shadow creeps toward the top of Jupiter's northern hemisphere. Two of Jupiter's largest storms are visible, the Great Red Spot on the western (left) limb of the planet, trailing the Little Red Spot on the eastern limb, at slightly lower latitude. The Great Red Spot is a 300-year old storm more than twice the size of Earth. The Little Red Spot, which formed over the past decade from the merging of three smaller storms, is about half the size of its older and "greater" counterpart. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
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Hubble Finds Ozone on Jupite
…
| title |
Hubble Finds Ozone on Jupiter's Moon Ganymede |
| description |
Though ozone may be diminishing on Earth, it is being manufactured one-half billion miles away, on Jupiter's largest satellite, Ganymede. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope found ozone's spectral "fingerprint" during observations of Ganymede made by Keith Noll and colleagues at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland. These Hubble Faint Object Spectrograph results were presented at the American Astronomical Society's 27th Annual Meeting of the Division of Planetary Sciences in Kona, Hawaii. *Image Credit*: NASA |
|
Ganymede's Nergal Crater
| title |
Ganymede's Nergal Crater |
| date |
09.06.1996 |
| description |
Two impact craters surrounded by an unusual ejecta blanket dominate this high-resolution image of the surface of Jupiter's moon Ganymede. NASA's Galileo spacecraft photographed this region as it passed Ganymede during its second orbit through the jovian system. North is to the top of the picture, and the Sun illuminates the surface from the southeast. Nergal, the larger crater, is about 8 kilometers in diameter, while the smaller (unnamed) crater to its west is 3 kilometers across. The craters are situated in a region of bright grooved terrain named Byblus Sulcus, located in the northern part of Marius Regio at 390N latitude and 2010W longitude. The distinctive ejecta blanket that surrounds them is darker nearer the craters and brighter further away. The inner region of the ejecta is characterized by a lobate appearance indicative of the flow of a liquid (or slushy) substance over the surface. The flow was probably icy surface material melted by the energy released during the impact that formed the crater. The picture covers an area about 48 by 34 kilometers across at a resolution of 86 meters per picture element. The image was taken on September 6, 1996, by the Solid-State Imaging System onboard the Galileo spacecraft. *Image Credit*: Brown University |
|
Family Portrait of Jupiter's
…
| title |
Family Portrait of Jupiter's Great Red Spot and the Galilean Satellites |
| description |
This "family portrait," a composite of the Jovian system, includes the edge of Jupiter with its Great Red Spot, and Jupiter's four largest moons, known as the Galilean satellites. From top to bottom, the moons shown are Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. The Great Red Spot, a storm in Jupiter's atmosphere, is at least 300 years old. Winds blow counterclockwise around the Great Red Spot at about 400 kilometers per hour (250 miles per hour). The storm is larger than one Earth diameter from north to south, and more than two Earth diameters from east to west. In this oblique view, the Great Red Spot appears longer in the north-south direction. Europa, the smallest of the four moons, is about the size of Earth's moon, while Ganymede is the largest moon in the solar system. North is at the top of this composite picture in which the massive planet and its largest satellites have all been scaled to a common factor of 15 kilometers (9 miles) per picture element. The Solid State Imaging (CCD) system aboard NASA's Galileo spacecraft obtained the Jupiter, Io and Ganymede images in June 1996, while the Europa images were obtained in September 1996. Because Galileo focuses on high resolution imaging of regional areas on Callisto rather than global coverage, the portrait of Callisto is from the 1979 flyby of NASA's Voyager spacecraft. Launched in October 1989, the spacecraft's mission was to conduct detailed studies of the giant planet, its largest moons and the Jovian magnetic environment. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, managed the mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Eyeing Ganymede
| title |
Eyeing Ganymede |
| date |
11.18.2000 |
| description |
Jupiter casts a baleful eye toward the moon Ganymede in this enhanced-contrast image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft. Jupiter's "eye', the Great Red Spot, was captured just before disappearing around the eastern edge of the planet. The furrowed eyebrow above and to the left of the spot is a turbulent wake region caused by westward flow that has been deflected to the north and around the Red Spot. The smallest features visible are about 240 kilometers (150 miles) across. Within the band south of the Red Spot are a trio of white ovals, high pressure counterclockwise-rotating regions that are dynamically similar to the Red Spot. The dark filamentary features interspersed between white ovals are probably cyclonic circulations and, unlike the ovals, are rotating clockwise. Jupiter's equatorial zone stretching across the planet north of the Spot appears bright white, with gigantic plume clouds spreading out from the equator both to the northeast and to the southeast in a chevron pattern. This zone looks distinctly different than it did during the Voyager flyby 21 years ago. Then, its color was predominantly brown and the only white plumes conspicuous against the darker material beneath them were oriented southwest-to-northeast. Ganymede is Jupiter's largest moon, about 50 percent larger than our own Moon and larger than the planet Mercury. The visible details in this image are different geological terrains. Dark areas tend to be older and heavily cratered, brighter areas are younger and less cratered. Cassini images of Ganymede and Jupiter's other large moons taken near closest approach on Dec. 30 will have resolutions about four times better than that seen here. This image is a color composite of ones taken with different filters by Cassini's narrow-angle camera on Nov. 18, 2000, processed to enhance contrast. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. *Image Credit*: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona |
|
Jupiter and the Galilean Sat
…
| title |
Jupiter and the Galilean Satellites |
| description |
Jupiter and its four planet-size moons, called the Galilean satellites, were photographed in early March by Voyager 1 and assembled into this collage. They are not to scale but are in their relative positions. Startling new discoveries on the Galilean moons and the planet Jupiter made by Voyager 1 have been factored into a new mission design for Voyager 2. Voyager 2 will fly past Jupiter on July 9. Reddish Io (upper left) is nearest Jupiter, then Europa (center), Ganymede and Callisto (lower right). Nine other much smaller satellites circle Jupiter, one inside Io's orbit and the other millions of miles from the planet. Not visible is Jupiter's faint ring of particles, seen for the first time by Voyager 1. The Voyager Project is managed for NASA's Office of Space Science by Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Triple Eclipse
| title |
Triple Eclipse |
| description |
At first glance, Jupiter looks like it has a mild case of the measles. Five spots - one colored white, one blue, and three black are scattered across the upper half of the planet. Closer inspection by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope reveals that these spots are actually a rare alignment of three of Jupiter's largest moons - Io, Ganymede, and Callisto - across the planet's face. In this image, the telltale signatures of this alignment are the shadows [the three black circles] cast by the moons. Io's shadow is located just above center and to the left, Ganymede's on the planet's left edge, and Callisto's near the right edge. Only two of the moons, however, are visible in this image. Io is the white circle in the center of the image, and Ganymede is the blue circle at upper right. Callisto is out of the image and to the right. On Earth, we witness a solar eclipse when our Moon's shadow sweeps across our planet's face as it passes in front of our Sun. Jupiter, however, has four moons roughly the same size as Earth's Moon. The shadows of three of them occasionally sweep simultaneously across Jupiter. The image was taken March 28, 2004, with Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer. Seeing three shadows on Jupiter happens only about once or twice a decade. Why is this triple eclipse so unique? Io, Ganymede, and Callisto orbit Jupiter at different rates. Their shadows likewise cross Jupiter's face at different rates. For example, the outermost moon Callisto orbits the slowest of the three satellites. Callisto's shadow moves across the planet once for every 20 shadow crossings of Io. Add the crossing rate of Ganymede's shadow and the possibility of a triple eclipse becomes even more rare. Viewing the triple shadows in 2004 was even more special, because two of the moons were crossing Jupiter's face at the same time as the three shadows. Jupiter appears in pastel colors in this photo because the observation was taken in near-infrared light. Astronomers combined images taken in three near-infrared wavelengths to make this color image. The photo shows sunlight reflected from Jupiter's clouds. In the near infrared, methane gas in Jupiter's atmosphere limits the penetration of sunlight, which causes clouds to appear in different colors depending on their altitude. Studying clouds in near-infrared light is very useful for scientists studying the layers of clouds that make up Jupiter's atmosphere. Yellow colors indicate high clouds, red colors lower clouds, and blue colors even lower clouds in Jupiter's atmosphere. The green color near the poles comes from a thin haze very high in the atmosphere. Ganymede's blue color comes from the absorption of water ice on its surface at longer wavelengths. Io's white color is from light reflected off bright sulfur compounds on the satellite's surface. In viewing this rare alignment, astronomers also tested a new imaging technique. To increase the sharpness of the near-infrared camera images, astronomers, speeded up Hubble's tracking system so that Jupiter traveled through the telescope's field of view much faster than normal. This technique allowed scientists to take rapid-fire snapshots of the planet and its moons. They then combined the images into one single picture to show more details of the planet and its moons. *Image Credit*: NASA, ESA, and E. Karkoschka (University of Arizona) |
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Capturing Callisto
| title |
Capturing Callisto |
| date |
02.27.2007 |
| description |
The New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) captured these two images of Jupiter's outermost large moon, Callisto, as the spacecraft flew past Jupiter in late February. New Horizons' closest approach distance to Jupiter was 2.3 million kilometers (1.4 million miles), not far outside Callisto's orbit, which has a radius of 1.9 million kilometers (1.2 million miles). However, Callisto happened to be on the opposite side of Jupiter during the spacecraft's pass through the Jupiter system, so these images, taken from 4.7 million kilometers (3.0 million miles) and 4.2 million kilometers (2.6 million miles) away, are the closest of Callisto that New Horizons obtained. Callisto's ancient, crater-scarred surface makes it very different from its three more active sibling satellites, Io, Europa and Ganymede. Callisto, 4,800 kilometers (3000 miles) in diameter, displays no large-scale geological features other than impact craters, and every bright spot in these images is a crater. The largest impact feature on Callisto, the huge basin Valhalla, is visible as a bright patch at the 10 o'clock position. The craters are bright because they have excavated material relatively rich in water ice from beneath the dark, dusty material that coats most of the surface. The two images show essentially the same side of Callisto - the side that faces Jupiter - under different illumination conditions. The images accompanied scans of Callisto's infrared spectrum with New Horizons' Linear Etalon Imaging Spectral Array (LEISA). The New Horizons science team designed these scans to study how the infrared spectrum of Callisto's water ice changes as lighting and viewing conditions change, and as the ice cools through Callisto's late afternoon. The infrared spectrum of water ice depends slightly on its temperature, and a goal of New Horizons when it reaches the Pluto system (in 2015) is to use the water ice features in the spectrum of Pluto's moon Charon, and perhaps on Pluto itself, to measure surface temperature. Callisto provided an ideal opportunity to test this technique on a much better-known body. The left image, taken at 05:03 Universal Time on February 27, 2007, is centered at 5 degrees south, 5 degrees west, and has a solar phase angle of 46 degrees. The right image was taken at 03:25 Universal Time on February 28, 2007. It is centered at 4 degrees south, 356 degrees west, and has a solar phase angle of 76 degrees. Released: April 5, 2007 Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute |
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Image of Pele erupting on Io
| Name |
Image of Pele erupting on Io |
|
Jupiter System Montage
| Title |
Jupiter System Montage |
| Full Description |
Jupiter and its four planet-size moons, called the Galilean satellites, were photographed in early March 1979 by Voyager 1 and assembled into this collage. They are not to scale but are in their relative positions. Startling new discoveries on the Galilean moons and the planet Jupiter made by Voyager l factored into a new mission design for Voyager 2. Reddish Io (upper left) is nearest Jupiter, then Europa (center), Ganymede and Callisto (lower right). Nine other much smaller satellites circle Jupiter, one inside Io's orbit and the other millions of miles from the planet. Not visible is Jupiter's faint ring of particles, seen for the first time by Voyager 1. The Voyager Project is managed for NASA's Office of Space Science by Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology. |
| Date |
06/22/1979 |
| NASA Center |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
|
Voyager 1 Image of Ganymede
| Title |
Voyager 1 Image of Ganymede |
| Full Description |
Voyager 1 took this picture of Ganymede from a distance of 1.6 million miles. Ganymede is Jupiter's largest satellite with a radius of approximately 2600 kilometers, about 1.5 times that of Earth's Moon. Ganymede is the seventh and largest of Jupiter's known satellites and is the third of the Galilean moons. Discovered in 1610 by Galileo and Marius, Ganymede is the largest satellite in the Solar System. It was named after the Greek mythical character, Ganymede, a handsome Trojan boy that Zeus took to Olympus to be a cupbearer for the gods (one of the only humans in Greek mythology who became immortal). Ganymede is larger than Mercury but has only half Mercury's mass. It has a bulk density of only two grams per cubic centimeter, almost half that of Earth's Moon. Ganymede is most likely composed of a mixture of rock and ice. The long white filaments resemble rays associated with impacts on the lunar surface. The various colors of different regions probably represent differing surface materials. Several dots of a single color (blue, green, and orange) on the picture are the result of markings on the camera used for pointing determinations and are not physical markings. Voyager scientists discovered that Ganymede has its own magnetosphere embedded inside Jupiter's large one. JPL manages and controls the Voyager Project for NASA's Office of Space Science. |
| Date |
03/04/1979 |
| NASA Center |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
|
Voyager 1 View of Callisto
| Title |
Voyager 1 View of Callisto |
| Full Description |
Voyager 1 took this picture of Callisto during Voyager's approach to Jupiter's outer large satellite in 1979. Both Galileo and Marius discovered Callisto in 1610. In Greek mythology, Callisto was a nymph loved by Zeus and thus hated by Hera. Hera turned her into a bear, which Zeus placed in the heavens as the constellation Ursa Major. Voyager was 350,000 kilometers from Callisto and took this picture that shows features about seven kilometers wide across the surface. Callisto is a little smaller than Ganymede (Callisto is about the size of Mercury) and it seems that it is composed of a mixture of ice and rock (about 40 percent ice and 60 percent rock and iron). The darker color of Callisto (about half as reflective as Ganymede but still twice as bright as the Moon) implies that the upper surface is "dirty ice" or water- rich rock frozen on Callisto's cold surface (approximately -243 Fahrenheit degrees at the equator). Callisto's atmosphere is mostly carbon dioxide. Far more craters appear on the surface of Callisto than on the surface of Ganymede, leading scientists to believe that Callisto is the oldest of the Galilean satellites. Callisto could date back as far as four billion years ago and has remained relatively unchanged in the history of space. |
| Date |
03/06/1979 |
| NASA Center |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
|
Hubble Finds Ozone on Jupite
…
| Title |
Hubble Finds Ozone on Jupiter's Moon Ganymede |
| General Information |
What is an American Astronomical Society Meeting release? A major news announcement issued at an American Astronomical Society meeting, the premier astronomy conference. Though ozone may be diminishing on Earth, it is being manufactured one-half billion miles away, on Jupiter's largest satellite, Ganymede. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope found ozone's spectral "fingerprint" during observations of Ganymede made by Keith Noll and colleagues at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland. These Hubble Faint Object Spectrograph results were presented at the American Astronomical Society's 27th Annual Meeting of the Division of Planetary Sciences in Kona, Hawaii. Read more: * Release Text [ http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/1995/36/text/ ] |
|
Hubble Discovers Bright New
…
| Title |
Hubble Discovers Bright New Spot on Io |
|
Hubble Photo Gallery of Jupi
…
| Title |
Hubble Photo Gallery of Jupiter's Galilean Satellites |
|
Hubble Discovers New Class o
…
| Title |
Hubble Discovers New Class of Gravitational Lens for Probing the Structure of the Cosmos |
|
Hubble Discovers New Class o
…
| Title |
Hubble Discovers New Class of Gravitational Lens for Probing the Structure of the Cosmos |
|
Hubble Discovers Bright New
…
| Title |
Hubble Discovers Bright New Spot on Io |
|
Hubble Discovers New Class o
…
| Title |
Hubble Discovers New Class of Gravitational Lens for Probing the Structure of the Cosmos |
|
Satellite Footprints Seen in
…
| Title |
Satellite Footprints Seen in Jupiter Aurora |
|
Hubble Spots Rare Triple Ecl
…
| Title |
Hubble Spots Rare Triple Eclipse on Jupiter |
|
A79-7020
Photographer : JPL Range : 7
…
2/28/79
| Description |
Photographer : JPL Range : 7 million kilometers (5 million miles) Callisto is Jupiter's outermost Galilean satellites and darkest of the four(but almost twice as bright as Earth's Moon). Mottled appearance from bright and dark patches. Bright spots seem like rayed or bright halved craters seen on our Moon. This face is always turned toward Jupiter. Photo taken through violet filter. Ganymede is slightly larger than Mercury but much less dense (twice the density of water). Its surface brightness is 4 times of Earth's Moon. Mare regions (dark features) are like the Moon's but have twice the brightness, and believed to be unlikely of rock or lava as the Moon's are. It's north pole seems covered with brighter material and may be water frost. Scattered brighter spots may be related to impact craters or source of fresh ice. |
| Date |
2/28/79 |
|
A79-7120
Photographer: Voyager 1 spac
…
1979
| Description |
Photographer: Voyager 1 spacecraft Jupiter moon Ganymede |
| Date |
1979 |
|
A79-7123
Photographer: Voyager 1 spac
…
1979
| Description |
Photographer: Voyager 1 spacecraft Jupiter moon Ganymede |
| Date |
1979 |
|
AC79-0143-3
Photo by Voyager 1 (JPL) The
…
1/24/79
| Description |
Photo by Voyager 1 (JPL) The spacecraft took this photo of the planet Jupiter on Jan 24, while still more than 25 million miles (40 million kilometers) away. As the spacecraft draws closer to the planet (about 1 million kilometers a day) more details are emergng in the turbulent clouds. The Great Red Spot shows prominently below center, surrounded by what scientists call a remarkably complex region of the giant planet's atmosphere. An elongated yellow cloud within the Great Red Spot is swirling around the spot's interior boundary in a counterclockwise direction with a period of a little less than six days, confirming the whirlpool-like circulation that astronomers have suspected from ground-based photographs. Ganymede, Jupiter's largest satellite, can be seen to the lower left of the planet. Ganymede is a planet-sized body larger than Mercury. This color photo was assembled at Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Image Processing Lab from there black and white images taken through filters. The Voyagers are managed for NASA's Office of Space Science by Jet Propulsion Laboratory. (ref: P-20945C Mission Image 1-9) |
| Date |
1/24/79 |
|
Pele Erupting on Lo
| Name of Image |
Pele Erupting on Lo |
| Date of Image |
2001-01-01 |
| Full Description |
This image of Jupiter's moon, lo, was taken by the Chandra X-Ray Observatory (CXO). Shown here is the most extreme example of the effect of tidal forces as Lo is being pulled by massive Jupiter on one side and by the outer moons Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede on the other. The opposing tidal forces alternately squeeze and stretch its interior, causing the solid surface to rise and fall by about 100 meters. The enormous amount of heat and pressure generated by the resulting friction creates colossal volcanoes and fractures on the surface of this moon. |
|
A Polar Crater on Ganymede
| Title |
A Polar Crater on Ganymede |
| Description |
This circular 36 kilometer (22 mile) diameter impact crater near the north pole of Jupiter's moon Ganymede has a floor that is partially brightened. On September 6, 1996, NASA's Galileo spacecraft obtained images of an 18 kilometer (11 miles) wide swath through this area. The Galileo data, acquired at a resolution of 46 meters (151 feet) pixel (picture element), is shown overlain on data obtained by NASA's Voyager spacecraft in 1979. In Voyager data the crater was thought to be flooded by icy volcanism, but in Galileo data it is seen to be brightened by frost deposition. The Voyager data, taken at a resolution of 1.3 kilometers (0.8 miles) per pixel, shows a circular feature with a bright deposit on the northern half of its floor. North is toward the top of the picture. Illumination in the image is from the southeast, and frost appears to be collecting on north facing slopes of ridges and crater rims. Fractures cross the floor of the large crater, and the northeastern rim displays two large blocks of ice which have collapsed off the side of the steep crater wall. The Galileo images were taken by the Solid State Imaging (CCD) system at a range of about 2243 kilometers (1391 miles) from the surface of Ganymede. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA manages the Galileo mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. JPL is an operating division of California Institute of Technology (Caltech). This image and other images and data received from Galileo are posted on the World Wide Web, on the Galileo mission home page at URL http://galileo.jpl.nasa.gov. Background information and educational context for the images can be found at URL http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/sepo |
| Date |
03.25.1997 |
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