Juno picks up hints of activity on Jupiter’s icy moon Europa
Reported by Andrew Jones
The surface
of Europa
© Getty; NASA
NASA’s Juno spacecraft made a close flyby of Jupiter’s intriguing moon Europa in 2022, revealing potential hints of present-day surface activity. The spacecraft’s Stellar Reference Unit (SRU), which is a star camera designed to assist Juno’s onboard attitude determination, was used to image Europa’s surface in high resolution while being lit up by sunlight scattered off Jupiter. The SRU image from the flyby is explored in an article published in the journal JGR Planets on 22 December 2023. The image shows an oddly shaped area of the icy surface, measuring 37 by 67 kilometres (23 by 42 miles) and resembling a platypus. In other words, it exhibits a body part in the north and a bill part in the south. Both areas – which are joined by a cracked neck-like formation – contain large ice blocks that are each about one kilometre (0.62 miles) in size and cast shadows.