2024-10-01 16:07:59
MADRID, October 1 (EUROPA PRESS) –
NASA has taken the sharpest picture ever taken of Earth’s radiation belts: the edges of charged particles are trapped in the Earth’s magnetic shield, or magnetosphere.
Apparatus The Jovian Energetic Neutrals and ions (JENI), built by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), took the picture when ESA’s Juice probe – on which it was installed – leaving the Earth moving to the moons of Jupiter.
What he brings is invisible to human eyes. Unlike traditional cameras that rely on light, JENI uses special sensors to neutralize enemies emitted by charged particles interacting with atmospheric hydrogen gas that surrounds the Earth. The JENI instrument is the evolution of a similar instrument on NASA’s Cassini mission that probed the magnetospheres of Saturn and Jupiter.
“As soon as we saw the new sacred images, we all greeted each other with applause,” he said in a word Matina Gkioulidou, Deputy Director of JENI at APL. “It is clear that we have obtained a large volume of hot plasma around the Earth in unprecedented detail, an achievement that has caused excitement for what is to come at Jupiter.”
On August 19, JENI and its companion Jovian Energetic Electrons (JoEE) particle instrument made the most of their brief 30-minute encounter with the Moon. As the asteroid approaches only 750 kilometers above the surface of the moon, instruments collect data on the interaction of the space region with its closest celestial companion. It’s an interaction that scientists hope to see higher up on Jupiter’s moons, as the gas giant’s radiation-rich magnetosphere flies over.
On August 20, Juice was sounded towards Earth’s magnetosphere, passing about 60,000 kilometers above the Pacific Ocean, where the probes got their first taste of the harsh environment that awaits Jupiter. Passing through the magnetic tail, JoEE and JENI encounter the dense, low-energy plasma characteristic of this region before entering the heart of the radiation belts. There, the material They measure the million-degree plasma that surrounds the Earth to investigate the secrets of plasma heating known to fuel extraordinary phenomena in planetary magnetospheres.
Now, after using the gravity of the Moon and Earth, Juice’s trajectory has been successfully adjusted for a future meeting with Venus in August 2025. The flyby of Venus will act as a gravitational slingshot, sending Juice back to Earth and preparing for the addition two. flybys in September 2026 and January 2029. Only then the spacecraft, now at full speed. It will make its grand entrance at Jupiter in July 2031.
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