Image Shows the Juno SpacecraftAbout Juno spacecraft:
- The spacecraft has been named after the Roman goddess Juno,
- The wife of Jupiter who is considered as the god of the sky in ancient Greco-Roman mythology.
- Juno spacecraft is powered by solar arrays, commonly used by satellites orbiting Earth and working in the inner Solar System
- Juno is the first mission designed by NASA to see beneath Jupiter՚s clouds.
- It has travelled 2.7 billion kilometres since its launch to reach Jupiter.
- The mission previously was referred to by the backronym JUpiter Near-polar Orbiter.
Orbit:
- Orbit Jupiter from pole to pole, 5,000 kilometres above planet՚s cloud tops.
- It will model Jupiter՚s charged particles and magnetic fields for the first time to study its structure under the sky.
Payloads:
- Juno has nine tools on board to study atmosphere, gravity, magnetic field and possible existence of solid core in Jupiter.
- It will map Jupiter՚s gravity and magnetic fields and also track how much water is present in the atmosphere.
Mission Life:
- Juno mission life of 20 months from July 2016 to Feb 2018.
- In this, the spacecraft will circle the Jupiter 37 times before finally making a death plunge in 2018.
- In order to avoid accidentally crashing one of the planet՚s moons.
Important Note:
- Juno is not the first spacecraft to orbit Jupiter.
- It is second spacecraft to orbit Jupiter,
- After Galileo probe which had orbited the planet from 1995 - 2003.
- Galileo mission had found proof of subsurface saltwater on Jupiter՚s moons Europa, Callisto and Ganymede.
About Jupiter:
- Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and after Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. Jupiter is largest in the Solar System.
- Jupiter was known to astronomers of ancient times.
- It is known for its Great Red Spot because of a storm (bigger than size of Earth) that has been raging for hundreds of years.
✍Examrace Team at Aug 21, 2021