The Key to Unlocking the Secrets of the Moon‘Ganymede’

Our solar system consists of Sun, Moon and eight planets including Earth. Far across the solar system,Earth appears as pale blue dot. A spacecraft that was sent by NASA “Galileo” eight years ago has been orbiting Jupiter. During this period it sent the spates of discoveries; one the gas giant’s moons, it includes the observation of a magnetic environment around Ganymede that is the largest Moon of Jupiter as well as the solar system.

The lead author of a recent paper about Ganymede’s magnetosphere at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland says: “We are now coming back over 20 years later to take a new look at some of the data that was never published and finish the story, We found there's a whole piece no one knew about.” The new and recent results showed the stormy scene that the particles blasted off the moon’s icy surface as a result of incoming plasma rain, and strong flows of plasma pushed between Jupiter and Ganymede due to an explosive magnetic event occurring between the two bodies' magnetic environments. Scientists think these observations could be key to unlocking the secrets of the moon, such as why Ganymede's auroras are so brightThe Future study of the PLS data from that encounter may yet provide new insights related to subsurface oceans previously determined to exist within the moon using data from both Galileo and the Hubble Space Telescope. The Galileo mission was funded by NASA's Solar System Workings program and managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington

By: Shruti Anand

Content: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/04/180430131826.htm