Abstract | Mission Juno is the second flight project in the NASA Program New Frontiers.
The Juno spacecraft, launched in August 5, 2011 (Fig 3), began orbiting the
planet Jupiter on July 4, 2016. The principal scientific goal of the mission is exploration
of the planet itself, not of its many moons. The spacecraft will map the planet’s
gravitational field, magnetic field, and the morphology of the polar magnetospheres.
Furthermore, it will explore the composition and the dynamics of the atmosphere and
the opacity of the cloud cover. Extraordinary engineering feature of the mission is the
reliance on the solar power, instead of the customary thermoelectric power. The
spacecraft Juno will be decommissioned in February 2018, upon completion of the
planned 37 orbits of Jupiter. |