NASA Juno Amati Garam On Ganymede Moon Surface

Juno observed salt on Ganymede's surface to find ice (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA - The United States Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) is currently observing the surface of Ganymede, Jupiter's largest moon that beats the size of the planet Mercury.

Using the Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) spectrometer on Juno planes, NASA wants to observe further about the origins of Ganymede and the composition of the sea in it.

Before using Juno, NASA had observed the surface of Ganymede using the Galileo aircraft, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT).

The results of his observations show that Ganymede has salt and organic material on its surface. However, the resolution of the observations is still very low, so NASA needs to make further observations.

Therefore, Juno has been flown upwards of Ganymede since 2021. This aircraft continues to record the surface of Ganymede's moon through a minimum distance of 1,046 kilometers and the results are quite satisfying.

Spectrometers from JIRAM managed to collect data with the best resolution. Through this data, scientists can detect and analyze various water materials, including hydrated sodium chloride, amonium chloride, sodium bicarbonate, and aldehina aliphatics.

The presence of ammonia salt suggests that Ganymede may have gathered cold enough material to condense ammonia during its formation, said Juno researcher Federico Tosi, in a NASA release.

So far, Juno has found large amounts of salt and organic material in several areas of Ganymede, such as dark and bright areas at latitudes protected by magnetic fields.

The carbonate salt they find is believed to be the remains of ice rich in carbon dioxide. If these salts are proven to come from ice, NASA will probably continue to observe finding salt sea water beneath the surface.