usatoday24
On September 21, 2003 the Galileo probe He was immolated in Jupiter’s dense atmosphere, the planet he had been investigating for almost a decade. 30 years after the arrival of the probe to the Jovian orbit and more than 20 years after the end of its mission, the NASA probe continues to offer us new information thanks to the old data that it sent us in its day.
A new oceanic world. The study in question has indicated that Calisto is “most likely” an ocean world, a rocky body covered by a layer of water at least in a liquid. The key to the new study has been in a more exhaustive use of the data provided by the Galileo mission, including all its magnetic measurements.
Callisto Callisto It is the satellite farther from your planet of Among the so -called four Galilean moons of Jupiter. It is also the second largest moon of Jupiter, with a simular size to that of mercury but with a remarkably smaller mass.
One of the most striking details is its surface full of craters which gives Callisto an appearance “similar to a golf ball” The suspicion that this satellite hid an ocean inside It is not newbut the intensity of his ionosphere had been a limit to our ability to study the interior of the Jovian moon from a distance.
The reason is that researchers They believed That the satellite ionosphere, an electrically and located conductive region located in the highest layers of Calisto’s atmosphere, could be “imitating” the magnetic footprint that would emit a hypothetical salt and conductive water ocean. That is, astronomers could not know if the magnetism detected proceeded from outside or inside the moon.
A new look. New data and analysis tools have allowed to solve this issue. The team responsible for the new study incorporated the set of measurements Magnetic available from the eight occasions in which the Galileo probe survived Callisto.
Combining methods. The team combined the analysis of the data obtained by Galileo with a model that simulated Calisto’s ionosphere. They compared the results of the observations with what the suggested in the theoretical model.
From the results obtained, the team responsible for the study concludes that the satellite ionosphere cannot by itself explain the magnetism detected, but that the existence of a salt water ocean under the surface of the moon could contribute to the observations. The results therefore suggest the existence of such an ocean.
The details of the analysis and its results have been published In an article In the magazine AG ADVANCES.
The oceanic worlds of our solar system. Calisto is just one more in The list of candidates To oceanic worlds in our solar system, a list that includes different bodies in which we believe, with greater or lesser degree of certainty, that there are oceans. This list includes other moons such as Europe, Ganymedes, Lord it, Triton, and also a dwarf planet: Pluto.
These planets are of great interest to astrobiology since they are the main candidates to house life or the appropriate conditions for the emergence of this in our space neighborhood. That is why a whole new generation of probes is focused on The study of this type of environments.
The list includes NASA’s Europe Clipper Mission, and Juice (JUPITER ICY MOONS EXPLORER) of the European Space Agency. The first will be focused on analyzing in depth the moon Europe while the European mission will travel to several of these frozen worlds to collect information about what their layers of ice hide. To these missions, China Tianwen-4 could be added, whose observations could also give us important data about Calisto and his hidden ocean.
In Xataka | Juno has just given us an image we had never seen: lava rivers in a Jupiter satellite
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings