Remote-sensing data will complement Juno spacecraft’s in situ observations. The Space Telescope Science Institute recently awarded Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) a large project to use the Hubble and James Webb telescopes to remotely study Io, the most volcanically active body in the solar s
environment around Jupiter. Large Hubble projects request 75 orbits or more; this project will collect data during 122 orbits, which is how Hubble telescope time is allocated.“The timing of this project is critical. Over the next year, Juno will buzz past Io several times, offering rare opportunities to combine in situ and remote observations of this complex system,” said SwRI’s Dr. Kurt Retherford, principal investigator of the campaign, largely using 4.
SwRI is leading a study to understand how Io, the most volcanic body in our solar system, contributes to Jupiter’s plasmasphere. Juno’s JIRAM instrument images Io’s hot spots, data that will be complemented by Hubble and Webb telescope datasets. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/ASI/INAF/JIRAMIo’s escaping atmosphere is the dominant source of material in the Jovian magnetosphere, a vast bubble of charged particles swirling around the gas giant.
“The couplings between time-variable processes are central to understanding the Jupiter system holistically,” said Dr. Fran Bagenal, the project’s co-principal investigator from the University of Colorado at Boulder. “For example, how much sulfur is transported from Io to Europa’s surface? How do auroral features on Io compare with aurora on Earth — the northern lights — and Jupiter?”Io, the innermost large moon of Jupiter, supplies most of the charged particles in the planet’s magnetosphere.
“Most of these materials don’t actually escape straight out of the volcanoes but rather are associated with the sublimation of sulfur dioxide frost from Io’s dayside surface,” said Caltech’s Dr. Katherine de Kleer, another co-investigator with expertise in James Webb data analysis. “The interaction between Io’s atmosphere and the surrounding plasma provides the escape mechanism for gases released from the moon’s frozen surface.
“The chance for a holistic approach to Io investigations has not been available since a series of Galileo spacecraft flybys in 1999-2000 were supported by Hubble with a prolific 30-orbit campaign,” Retherford said. “The combination of Juno’s intensive in situ measurements with our remote-sensing observations will undoubtedly advance our understanding of Io’s role in driving coupled phenomena in the Jupiter system.
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