NASA's Juno Peers Inside a Giant
NASA's Juno spacecraft will make its long anticipated arrival at Jupiter on July 4. Coming face-to-face with the gas giant, Juno will begin to unravel some of the greatest mysteries surrounding our solar system's largest planet, including the origin of its massive magnetosphere.
Magnetospheres are the result of a collision between a planet's intrinsic magnetic field and the supersonic solar wind. Jupiter's magnetosphere – the volume carved out in the solar wind where the planet’s magnetic field dominates –extends up to nearly 2 million miles (3 million kilometers). If it were visible in the night sky, Jupiter's magnetosphere would appear to be about the same size as Earth’s full moon. By studying Jupiter's magnetosphere, scientists will gain a better understanding about how Jupiter's magnetic field is generated. They also hope to determine whether the planet has a solid core, which will tell us how Jupiter formed during the earliest days of our solar system.