Io moon nasa12/27/2023 ![]() Such a composition would rapidly separate into two distinct layers: a magma ocean floating on top of a mostly solid shell. Their results indicate that the amount of tidal heating within Io is probably insufficient to maintain a spongey structure of interconnected solid rock bathed in molten magma. Yoshinori Miyazaki and David Stevenson, both at Caltech in Pasadena, California, have built a computer model to study different possibilities for Io’s subsurface magma, as well as different degrees of tidal heating. Recently, a reanalysis of 1990s data from the Galileo probe’s magnetometer instrument has suggested that Io could have a global layer of largely molten rock at least 50km-thick underground.īut does this exist as a complete magma ocean, or is it more like a ‘magmatic sponge’, with an interconnected network of solid rock soaked through with liquid magma? Lava erupts on Jupiter's moon Io, captured by the Galileo spacecraft. This is important because it affects the dissipation of tidal heating, which is a key part in understanding Io’s surface features. What’s not well understood, however, is exactly how much magma melt there is below the surface, or what form it takes. Normally, tidal effects would dissipate as the moon’s orbit becomes more circular over time, and its rotation becomes locked to its orbital period.īut in Io’s case, the gravitational effects of the other Galilean moons keep nudging it into an elliptical orbit, maintaining this fierce tidal heating so that its volcanism has persisted for billions of years. An eruption on Jupiter's volcanic moon Io, as seen by the Galileo spacecraft. Read our interview with Linda Morabito, the NASA scientist who discovered volcanoes on Io. This perpetual bending and flexing generates intense tidal heating in the interior of the moon, melting its silicate rock crust into hot magma. The powerful gravitational pull of Jupiter tugging on Io constantly distorts its shape. The driving force behind all this activity is tidal heating. Our Moon is a cold, dead world, while Io is the most volcanically active body in the Solar System – even more so than Earth – and is constantly spewing itself inside out with intense eruptions. The moon Io, the innermost of Jupiter's Galilean moons, is a violent, tortured little world.ĭespite being almost the same size as our own Moon, the two couldn’t be more different. Jupiter's volcanic moon Io probably has a subsurface magma ocean
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