Sent in 2022, the JUICE (JUpiter Icy Moons Explorer) is a European explorer who will study Jupiter in order to unravel the mysteries of the gas giant and the habitability of its icy moons.
The spacecraft’s solar wings form a distinctive cross totaling 97 square meters, the largest it has ever flown on an interplanetary mission.
JUICE
JUICE is scheduled for launch in 2022 on a seven-year journey to the Jovian system . It will be equipped with a laboratory of instruments that will investigate Jupiter’s turbulent atmosphere and the immense magnetosphere, as well as the study of the planetary-size moons Ganymede, Europa and Callisto. JUICE cameras will capture details of the moon’s features, as well as identify the ice and minerals on its surfaces.
Ganymede is the only moon in the Solar System that generates its own internal magnetic field, and JUICE will use its 10-meter-long magnetometer pole to document its behavior and explore its interaction with Jupiter’s own magnetosphere .
Its final orbit around Ganymede will be a milestone: it will be the first time that a moon beyond ours has been orbited by a spacecraft .