Almost two months after the launch of the European Space Agency’s Jupiter Moon Orbiter (JUICE), the spacecraft has successfully collected its first UV data.spacecraft Ultraviolet spectroscopy (UVS) equipment It is one of three projects that make up NASA’s contribution to space missions that focus on the largest planets in the solar system and their moons. The rover will explore potentially habitable worlds around gas giants and investigate Jupiter as a prototypical gas giant in the solar system and beyond.
[Related: Follow the JUICE mission as it launches to Jupiter and its many mysterious moons.]
JUICE is embarking on an eight-year, 4.1 billion-mile round trip to the Jupiter system, and the rover is deploying and activating multiple antennas, booms, sensors and instruments. The UVS instrument is the latest instrument to successfully perform this important task.
UVS was developed by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), San Antonio, Texas.
A little smaller than a microwave, the UVS weighs just over 40 pounds and consumes 7.5 watts of power. It is designed to measure the relative concentrations of various elements and molecules in the atmosphere of Jupiter’s moons after they reach the Jupiter system.
“Our team of SwRI scientists traveled to Darmstadt, Germany to test the pace of JUICE-UVS,” said JUICE-UVS Principal Investigator Randy Gladstone. said in a statement. “On June 20th, we opened the UVS aperture door for the first time to collect ultraviolet light from space. confirmed.”
Some of this data was imaged by the team as UVS scanned the Milky Way belt.
UVS is fifth instrument It is used in a series of spectrometers developed by SwRI for other spacecraft, including ESA’s Rosetta comet probe and NASA’s Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft. Three close-up views of Galilean satellites of Jupiter– Europa, Ganymede, Callisto.
All of these bodies are believed to have liquid water beneath their icy surfaces. Recording the ultraviolet light emitted, transmitted, and reflected by these objects could reveal the composition of their surfaces and atmospheres, as well as how they interact with the planets and their giant magnetospheres. be.
[Related: This hot Jupiter exoplanet unexpectedly hangs out with a super-Earth.]
In 2024, a similar instrument called Europa-UVS is scheduled to launch on NASA’s Europa Clipper. The rover, which will follow a more direct route and arrive in the Jupiter system about 15 months before JUICE, will focus on studying Europa’s habitability. Europa is the smallest of Jupiter’s Galilean moons and one of at least 90 known moons orbiting the gas giant.
“Two UVS instruments making measurements in the Jupiter system almost simultaneously offers exciting complementary scientific possibilities,” said Europa-UVS Principal Investigator and JUICE-UVS Deputy Director. Researcher Kurt Retherford said. said in a statement.
The JUICE mission will take a close-up view of Jupiter’s moons. NASA’s Galileo spacecraft visited the gas giant in 1995 and 2003, and the spacecraft and scientific instruments were built by teams from 15 European countries, Japan and the United States.
