NASA's Juno data points to new volcano on Jupiter moon Io
Washington, July 14 : Using data collected by NASA's Juno spacecraft, scientists have got clues to a previously undiscovered volcano on the Jupiter moon Io.
With its Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) instrument, the Juno spacecraft found a new heat source close to the south pole of Io, NASA said on Saturday.
"The new Io hotspot JIRAM picked up is about 300 kilometres from the nearest previously mapped hotspot," Alessandro Mura, a Juno co-investigator from the National Institute for Astrophysics in Rome, Italy, said in a statement.
"We are not ruling out movement or modification of a previously discovered hot spot, but it is difficult to imagine one could travel such a distance and still be considered the same feature," Mura added.
The infrared data were collected on December 16, 2017, when Juno was about 470,000 kilometers away from the moon.
The Juno team will continue to evaluate data collected on the December 16 flyby, as well as JIRAM data that will be collected during future (and even closer) flybys of Io, NASA said.
Past NASA missions of exploration that have visited the Jovian system (Voyagers 1 and 2, Galileo, Cassini and New Horizons), along with ground-based observations, have located over 150 active volcanoes on Io so far.
Scientists estimate that about another 250 or so are waiting to be discovered.
Juno has logged nearly 235 million kilometres since entering Jupiter's orbit on July 4, 2016.
Juno's 13th science pass will be on July 16, the US space agency said.
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Mumbai-Pune Expressway connecting link now fully operational
Mumbai (PTI): The Mumbai-bound carriageway of the Mumbai-Pune Expressway connecting link was opened to vehicular traffic on Saturday noon after a delay caused by the dismantling of inauguration infrastructure and cleaning work, a day after the Pune section became operational.
The 13.3 km-long "missing link", which bypasses a section of the Bhor Ghat stretch of the expressway and cuts travel time between Mumbai and Pune by 25 to 30 minutes, was inaugurated a day earlier by Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in the presence of Deputy CMs Eknath Shinde and Sunetra Pawar.
The Pune-bound carriageway of the corridor was opened to traffic immediately; however, the Mumbai-bound section remained closed to traffic for several hours after the inauguration.
An official of the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation told PTI on Saturday that the opening of the Mumbai-bound carriageway was delayed mainly due to the dismantling of the inauguration infrastructure and cleaning work.
The removal of the stage and other decorations was completed in the morning. The work to load and transport the material slightly delayed the opening of the carriageway.
Vehicular movement on the carriageway began after all the remaining material was cleared and road cleaning was completed, the official added.
The expressway control room said that despite significant vehicular movement, the access-controlled highway has not witnessed any major traffic snarls since Friday evening, after the Pune-bound carriageway of the missing link was opened to traffic.
The Missing Link project connects Khopoli (in Raigad) on the Mumbai side to Kusgaon near Lonavala in Pune district and is expected to make the expressway fully access-controlled, easing congestion in the ghat section.
Developed by the MSRDC and dubbed an "engineering marvel", the project includes two tunnels, two viaducts and a cable-stayed bridge over Tiger Valley. It bypasses the steep, accident-prone ghat section, where frequent traffic snarls are reported during weekends and on public holidays.
