A new expedition is launched to investigate three potentially habitable cold worlds.
April 15, 2023Tweet
The universe is filled with so many wonders that it is easy to forget about the celestial treasures in our own cosmic backyard. The James Webb Space Telescope recently shared a stunning new image of Cassiopeia A, the colorful glowing remains of an exploded star that first appeared in our skies 340 years ago. The Ingenuity helicopter just completed a record-breaking 50th flight on Mars, and Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, and three of its moons will receive a visit from a new spacecraft in the not-so-distant future. The European Space Agency’s Juice, or Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, mission launched Friday on an eight-year journey to the gas giant. Once there, Juice will spend 312 years orbiting Jupiter and three of its icy moons, Callisto, Ganymede and Europa, to determine if the worlds contain oceans underneath their ice shells and if those bodies of water could be habitable. Juice will also use its suite of 10 instruments to unravel some of the greatest mysteries still surrounding Jupiter, such as how the gas giant