Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer

About Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer: 

• It is a EuropeanSpace Agency (ESA) mission to explore Jupiter and three of its icy moons: Europa, Call is to and Ganymede.
• Objective: The probe aims to explore the possibilities of life in space and the origins of Jupiter.
• It will monitor Jupiter’s complex magnetic, radiation, and plasma environment in depth and its interplay with the moons.
• Approximately four years after its arrival at the Jupiter system, JUICE will move into orbit around the gas giant’s largest moon, Ganymede, to conduct the most extensive exploration of this body, which is larger than the solar system’s smallest planet, Mercury. 
• It will become the first probe to orbit a planetary moon other than Earth’s.
• Features
  • It has been fuelled with mono-methyl hydrazine (MMH) fuel and mixed oxides of nitrogen (MON) oxidizer, which ignites when the two come in contact. Juice will use this propellant to make critical course manoeuvres on its journey.
  • It will be packed with 10 instruments and will characterize Jupiter’s ocean-bearing icy moons.
  • It will be launched onboard the Ariane-5 rocket, a workhorse for the European Space Agency.

Q1: What is Plasma?

It is a state of matter along with solids, liquids and gases. When a neutral gas is heated such that some of the electrons are freed from the atoms or molecules, it changes state and becomes a plasma. It consists of a partially-ionized gas, containing ions, electrons, and neutral atoms.

Source: Europe’s JUICE probe set for close encounter with Earth before journey to Jupiter

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