NASA Jupiter Probe Makes 4th Flyby of Giant Planet

[bananas]

Source: Space.com

NASA's Juno spacecraft has flown by Jupiter for the fourth time.

Juno skimmed about 2,670 miles (4,300 kilometers) above Jupiter's cloud tops at 7:57 a.m. EST (1257 GMT) this morning (Feb. 2), zooming by at 129,000 mph (208,000 km/h) relative to the giant planet, NASA officials said.

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Juno is in a highly elliptical orbit that brings it close to the gas giant just once every 53 days. Most mission-relevant data is gathered during these flybys, the previous three of which occurred last August, October and December.

Though mission scientists are still analyzing the information collected during these previous encounters, they have already learned some interesting things.

"Revelations include that Jupiter's magnetic fields and aurora are bigger and more powerful than originally thought and that the belts and zones that give the gas giant's cloud top its distinctive look extend deep into the planet's interior," NASA officials wrote in a statement today. "Peer-reviewed papers with more in-depth science results from Juno's first three flybys are expected to be published within the next few months."

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Read more: http://www.space.com/35562-nasa-juno-spacecraft-4th-jupiter-flyby.html

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Juno is solar-powered:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft)

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Juno is the first mission to Jupiter to use solar panels instead of the radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTG) used by Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, the Voyager program, Ulysses, Cassini–Huygens, New Horizons, and the Galileo orbiter. It is also the farthest solar-powered trip in the history of space exploration.[69] Once in orbit around Jupiter, Juno will receive 4% as much sunlight as it would on Earth, but the global shortage of Pu-238,[70][71][72][73] as well as advances made in solar cell technology over the past several decades, makes it economically preferable to use solar panels of practical size to provide power at a distance of 5 AU from the Sun.

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Even at Jupiter, solar power is cheaper than nuclear energy.

[harun]

1. Good info on the Solar Panels. Much safer if there is an accident with the craft than

using RTG's.

[Bayard]

2. We need some good news right now.

Thanks!

[Hortensis]

3. Thanks, Bananas. I thought I saw Jupiter this "morning,"

well before that for most people, high and bright in the sky, so it just seem particularly nice to see this.