JAKARTA - Last week NASA's Juno spacecraft made it closer to Jupiter's moon dubbed Europa, featuring a stunning image of the moon entirely covered in ice.
The picture that Juno took gives humans a really slick first look at Europa, since NASA's spacecraft explored the moon more than two decades ago.
Uploaded on the JunoCam website, the first image shows a yellow and brown dress from Europa. Juno's own distance is 219 miles above the surface, where it is an area called Annwn Regis near the lunar equator.
The image highlights the mountains and craters of Europa. Europa itself is known to be slightly smaller than Earth's moon.
"The science team will compare Juno's complete image set with images from previous missions, to see if Europa's surface features have changed over the past two decades," Juno's Co-investigation Candy Hansen said in a statement quoted by CNET, Monday, October 3.
"The JunoCam image will fill out the current geological map, replacing the low resolution coverage in the area."
In addition to capturing beautiful images, Juno also collects data on Europa's composition, temperature, and atmosphere.
Europa is the latest mission from Juno. It arrived on Jupiter in 2016 and received an extension of the mission in 2021 to study the largest few moons of gas giants in more detail.
For your information, Juno itself has explored Ganymede and will see Io's moon next year. Not only that, NASA will also plan the upcoming Europa Clipper mission to explore Europa further.
It is claimed that Europa may hide a liquid ocean beneath the salty surface on its ice shell, making it a good place to look for potential habitability and signs of microbial life. The moon is also known to emit mysterious geysers that hint at activity down there.
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