What’s Going On Inside Io, Jupiter’s Volcanic Moon?
1 min read
Summary
When the Voyager 1 spacecraft flew past Io, a moon of Jupiter, in 1979, it revealed a surface covered in volcanoes — the first active eruptions seen beyond Earth.
The volcanoes were logically explained by a global magma ocean lying below Io’s crust, but new data from the Juno spacecraft reveals this is not the case.
While the results remain to be conclusive, the theory behind tidal heating — the process which creates magma on Io and is supposed to do the same on other moons such as Europa, with its underground ocean — will likely require reassessment.
It may change our understanding of how moons form and perhaps even teach us more about how our own moon came to be.
With the mysterious disappearance of Io’s magma ocean, the hunt for answers leads scientists to question what else might be powering its volcanic activity.
