Jupiter’s Juno probe in limbo
Whether the Juno probe will continue to study Jupiter is unclear amidst a U.S. government shutdown.
The spacecraft has orbited Jupiter since its arrival in 2016. It was a planned 20-month mission but was given the green light to explore longer. Its last extension placed the next mission deadline on Sept. 30th, but science journalist Emilee Speck said Juno’s mission is unlikely to continue.
“It completed its first round of mission of orbits, and then it got extended, and that extension ended on Sept. 30. The shutdown happened the next day,” Speck said. “We haven't had an update whether this mission somehow got a lifeline or not, but right now, we're thinking most likely not. The most recent statement I got from NASA said that they were going to adhere by that Sept. 30 cut.”
If abandoned, the spacecraft will orbit the planet until it’s pulled into Jupiter’s atmosphere and destroyed. Juno broke ground in terms of space travel and withstood almost a decade of Jupiter’s harsh radiation.
“One of the legacies of this mission will be troubleshooting a spacecraft dealing with radiation problems this far away from the sun, this far away from Earth. That's no small feat and then building a spacecraft to withstand that kind of radiation,” Speck said.
The opportunity to work collaboratively with NASA and process imagery captured by the probe was given to citizen scientists by using the camera aboard Juno.
As far as new planetary probes, NASA has shifted its focus to Europa, an icy moon of Jupiter. The Europa Clipper mission was launched last October and is expected to arrive in Europa’s orbit in 2030 to look for life in the water beneath its icy surface.
“The thing that's exciting about Europa is that they believe that it has a global ocean. There have been quite a few studies about how there's the ingredients for life possibly within this ocean,” Speck said. “Which doesn't mean they're going to find aliens. It just means they might find microbial life or the ingredients. It's very exciting, because when we think of life on Earth, we think of water.”
OSIRIS-APEX's mission continues
OSIRIS-APEX is still on track to rendezvous with the asteroid Apophis despite budget concerns.
Its primary mission of collecting samples from the asteroid Bennu was completed by the spacecraft, originally called OSIRIS-REx. Still in excellent condition, the spacecraft will now follow Apophis, a near-Earth asteroid expected to pass unusually close to the planet in 2029. The asteroid poses no threat to Earth.
According to Arizona State’s Daniella DellaGiustina, principal investigator of OSIRIS-APEX, insights into how the asteroid is affected by Earth’s gravity could provide useful insight when trying to defend our planet from more threating space rocks.
“This will be the first time in recorded history that we know of an object getting so close to Earth. It's interesting from a planetary defense perspective to figure out what might start happening to an object like Apophis when it gets this close to our planet,” DellaGiustina said. “We need answers to eventually defend the Earth against a hazardous asteroid that is making it all the way to the surface through an impact.”
OSIRIS-APEX and many other NASA missions were at risk of cancellation under the Trump administration’s proposed budget cuts. The mission is based at the University of Arizona, and bipartisan support from the state spread across Congress – giving it a potential lifeline.
“This is truly a once in every 7,500-year opportunity,” DellaGiustina said. “Because we were able to communicate that support, and that support was communicated more broadly, we saw ourselves in both the House and Senate versions of NASA's budget as outlined in various appropriations bills, and so NASA used that guidance to inform how they were going to plan for the next fiscal year.”
Dust covered many pieces of equipment on the spacecraft after collecting samples from Bennu. Using the Earth and moon as a benchmark as it passes on its way to the sun, the tools of OSIRIS-APEX will be adjusted to give the best possible look at Apophis.
“The moon is a well characterized object. We're looking at how the light is observed by all of our instruments of the moon and then comparing that to sort of known standards and using that to recalibrate our instruments,” DellaGiustina said. “By studying Earth when it's pretty far from our spacecraft and it's occupying just a tiny fraction of the field of view and our instruments, we can see, are those indications of life and habitability? Are they even observable?”
