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A JunoCam View of Europa

May 15, 2024
Jupiter’s moon Europa was captured by the JunoCam instrument aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft during the mission’s close flyby on Sept. 29, 2022. The images show the fractures, ridges, and bands that crisscross the moon’s surface.

Jupiter's moon Europa was captured by the JunoCam instrument aboard NASA's Juno spacecraft during the mission's close flyby on Sept. 29, 2022.

The picture is a composite of JunoCam's second, third, and fourth images taken during the flyby, as seen from the perspective of the fourth image. North is at the top. The resolution of images ranges from just over 0.5 to 2.5 miles per pixel (1 to 4 kilometers per pixel).

As with our Moon and Earth, one side of Europa always faces Jupiter, and that is the side of Europa visible here. Europa's surface is crisscrossed by fractures, ridges, and bands, which have erased terrain older than about 90 million years.

Citizen scientist Björn Jónsson processed the images to enhance the color and contrast.

JunoCam's raw images are available for the public to peruse and process into image products at https://missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam/processing. More information about NASA citizen science can be found at https://science.nasa.gov/citizenscience and https://www.nasa.gov/solve/opportunities/citizenscience.

More information about Juno is at https://www.nasa.gov/juno and https://missionjuno.swri.edu.

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