It would take another 12 years to get Galileo off the ground. That decision was reversed after a massive lobbying effort by the scientific community, and Congress approved the project later that year. NASA was intrigued by the thought of a Jupiter mission, but the idea went through years of budgetary discussions and management changes, as well as machinations in Congress.īy 1977, NASA was far enough in its planning to propose a "Jupiter orbiting probe" in its budget, but the idea was thrown out by a congressional appropriations subcommittee with oversight of the agency. This made a long-term mission to Jupiter more feasible, since the spacecraft wouldn't need to be as heavily shielded (making it more expensive to launch.) Pioneer 10, when it zoomed by the planet in 1973, discovered Jupiter's radiation was far less than scientists had anticipated. Four spacecraft had flown by the giant planet before – Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11, and Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. Jupiter was a target of interest for NASA for decades before Galileo's launch. For example, some Jupiter-sized extrasolar planets are very close to their parent star, and as such as are called "hot Jupiters." It's possible these planets migrated, but the processes are poorly understood. It's not clear if the solar system shares all of the same "life history" characteristics of other solar systems. Studying Jupiter in our own solar system gives us a window into the formation of these planets outside of our solar system. Galileo's work at Jupiter has gained even wider implications in the years afterward, because scientists have discovered thousands of exoplanet candidates. Open questions concerning Jupiter include the global abundance of water in Jupiter, how deep storm features go and where Jupiter's magnetic field comes from. Some missions are being considered for Jupiter's icy moons in the 2030s, such as NASA's Europa Clipper and the European Space Agency's JUpiter ICy moons Explorer (JUICE). Still, wider mysteries about Jupiter remain – even as NASA returned to the planet in 2016 with the Juno mission. Along with Galileo's data, this is helping professional astronomers gather data on how gas giants change on the scale of a few years, or decades. Studying Jupiter from Earth is easier than ever thanks to improvements in imaging technology, making it easier for even amateur astronomers to watch Jupiter's weather and periodic cometary impacts.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |