We’ve simply had our closest take a look at Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io for many years, due to NASA’s Juno spacecraft, which handed the moon on 30 December.

Juno, which has been orbiting Jupiter since 2016, has been taking more and more shut photos of Io in latest months as its path round Jupiter modifications.

This newest picture was taken simply 1500 kilometres above the moon’s floor. In it, a few of Io’s tons of of towering mountains are seen, which may attain greater than 10 kilometres tall, in addition to their lengthy, sharp shadows.

Io is considered essentially the most volcanically energetic physique within the photo voltaic system and has tons of of energetic volcanoes. These volcanoes are typically smaller than the biggest mountains, averaging only one or 2 kilometres in peak, and are tougher to make out within the picture.

Nonetheless, by evaluating photos and information from Juno’s earlier 56 flybys of the moon, astronomers can find out about how these volcanoes have different over time and why they’re so energetic.

Juno has additionally been investigating Jupiter’s different moons, together with Europa and Ganymede, gathering information and taking the closest photos since NASA’s Galileo orbiter visited the realm in 2001. In February, Juno will make one other extraordinarily shut flyby, once more at round 1500 kilometres above Io’s floor.

Juno is scheduled to de-orbit into Jupiter in direction of the top of 2025, after flying by Io an additional seven occasions, however that received’t be the top of our studying about Jupiter’s moons. NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft, which is ready to launch in October this yr, is designed to zip simply 25 kilometres above Europa’s floor and can present key details about its mysterious inside ocean, which is considered one of the crucial promising locations for all times within the photo voltaic system. The spacecraft ought to arrive at Europa in 2030.