Just when we thought Jupiter is exciting enough, there comes in another amazing discovery that woos us. This time, NASA has discovered evidence of a new volcano but on the planet’s moon instead of the planet.
NASA’s Juno spacecraft that is intended to study Jupiter has picked up the source of intense heat near the planet’s moon Io’s South Pole. Using its powerful infrared imagery instrumentation (Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper [JIRAM]), Juno detected clues of possible volcanic activity from a wide distance of 290,000 miles away.
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As per NASA, the data was initially collected back in December’s flyby past the moon Io and NASA’s scientists are confident that the hotspot is proof of a new volcano on Io. Ground-based observations have previously detected around 150 active volcanoes on the moon and scientists estimate that almost other 250 or so volcanoes are to be discovered.
Alessandro Mura, a Juno co-investigator said that there is slight possibility of this volcano being a previously discovered one. “The new Io hotspot JIRAM picked up is about 200 miles from the nearest previously mapped hotspot. We are not ruling out movement or modification of a previously discovered hot spot, but it is difficult to imagine one could travel such a distance and still be considered the same feature.”
Moreover, NASA also informed that the Juno team will continue analyzing the data with more infrared images to be collected in future.