We present maps of surface composition of Europa’s anti-jovian hemisphere acquired using high spatial resolution IFU multi-spectral data from the SPHERE instrument on the Very Large Telescope (0.95 to 1.65μm) […]
Europa
Posted inEuropa
Europa's Surface Water-ice Crystallinity And Correlations Between Lineae And Hydrate Composition
Europa’s surface composition and evidence for cryovolcanic activity can provide insight into the properties and composition of the subsurface ocean, allowing the evaluation of its potential habitability. One promising avenue […]
Posted inEuropa
The Influence of Temperature and Photobleaching on Irradiated Sodium Chloride at Europa-like Conditions
Europa’s leading hemisphere chaos regions have a spectral feature at 450 nm that has been attributed to absorption by crystal defects in irradiated sodium chloride, known as F-centers. Some discrepancies […]
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Are Water Plumes Spraying From Europa?
In 2005, images of a brilliant watery plume erupting from the surface of Saturn’s moon Enceladus captivated the world. The giant column of vapor, ice particles, and organic molecules spraying […]
Posted inAstrogeology, Europa, Icy Worlds, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
Do Oceanic Convection and Clathrate Dissociation Drive Europa's Geysers?
Water vapor geysers on Europa have been inferred from observations made by the Galileo spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the Keck Observatory. Unlike the water-rich geysers observed on Enceladus, […]
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The 3D Direct Simulation Monte Carlo Study Of Europa Gas Plume
Europa has been spotted to have water outgassing activities by the space and ground-based telescopes as well as reanalysis of the Galileo data (Roth et al. 2014; Sparks et al. […]
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Hubble Finds Evidence Of Persistent Water Vapor In One Hemisphere Of Europa
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope observations of Jupiter’s icy moon Europa have revealed the presence of persistent water vapor – but, mysteriously, only in one hemisphere. Europa harbors a vast ocean […]
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A Comprehensive Revisit Of Select Galileo/NIMS Observations Of Europa
The Galileo Near Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (NIMS) collected spectra of Europa in the 0.7-5.2 μm wavelength region, which have been critical to improving our understanding of the surface composition of […]
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Europa Clipper Hardware Makes Headway
Take a closer look at the complex choreography involved in building NASA’s Europa Clipper as the mission to explore Jupiter’s moon Europa approaches its 2024 launch date. The hardware that […]
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Pits, Uplifts And Small Chaos Features On Europa
One of the clearest but unresolved questions for Europa is the thickness of its icy shell. Europa’s surface is resplendent with geological features that bear on this question, and ultimately […]