NASA: Stunning images of lava lakes and mountains on Jupiter’s moon Io

Io is slightly larger than our own moon, but unlike any other part of the solar system, its surface is covered by hundreds of powerful volcanoeswhich eject lava fountains tens of kilometers high, visible even from large telescopes on Earth.

Juno flew within about 1,500 kilometers of Jupiter’s surface in December and February to capture the first detailed images of its northern latitudes.

“Io is just full of volcanoes, and we caught some of them in action,” announced Juno principal investigator Scott Bolton.

“We also got some great close-ups and other data on a 200km-long lava lake called Loki Patera. The specular reflection recorded by our instruments from the lake suggests that parts of Ius’ surface are smooth as glass, reminiscent of obsidian created by volcanic phenomena on Earth.”

Next, watch the Loki Patera animation created by NASA using Juno data:

Although the magma temperature on Io is in the thousands of degrees, the moon’s surface is probably minus 100 degrees Celsius, Bolton said. “When magma comes out as a volcano erupts, it freezes immediately and probably makes sulfur snow,” he said.

This is also the case at Loki Patera; while the lava lake itself is probably very hot, the top of the islands within it are probably very cold.

An impressive mountain

The Juno mission team used the spacecraft’s microwave instrument to create maps of Jupiter’s surface, showing how incredibly smooth it is. This is due to the lava that constantly emerges and covers the surface.

However, Juno also captured an impressive mountain, which the team named Steeple Mountain. He located it with the help of the sun shining on the surface of Ius, revealing the shadow of a very sharp and pointed peak. “We used the science data to understand the shadows and measure the distance,” said Bolton. “It might not be exactly right, but that’s what it would be like if you went there.”

Then watch the animation for the Steeple Mountain of Ios:

The team also used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array telescopes in Chile to observe the gases in Ius’ atmosphere. The researchers found evidence of an abundance of enriched sulfur and chlorine, suggesting that Io has probably been volcanically active for most or even the beginning of its existence, 4 billion years ago.

Unraveling the mysteries of the Virus

Io is in one constant tug of waras it is attracted by the enormous gravity of Jupiter, but also by its large moons, Europa and Ganymede.

These three worlds pull on Io so violently that its surface swells and shrinks by 100 meters, just like the tides on Earth only on Io it happens on solid ground. The forces exerted on Io cause an enormous amount of heat on its surface, which is why its subsurface remains like molten rock, consisting of either molten sulfur or silicate rocks. Constant volcanic eruptions help the moon relieve the gravitational pressure.

Io has been studied by many spacecraft, including Pioneer and Voyager in the 1970s and Galileo in the 1990s. And now, Juno’s revelations are helping scientists understand the forces behind the moon’s volcanic activity like never before .

With information from: Unprecedented images reveal jaw-dropping features of Jupiter’s ‘tortured moon’ by Ashley Strickland, CNN