Galileo NIMS Observes Amirani

	Galileo NIMS Observes Amirani
	by NASA
	Thumbnail
	Download
	Web page

	This image is the highest-resolution thermal, or heat
	image, ever made of Amirani, a large volcano on Jupiter's
	moon Io. It was taken on October 10, 1999, by the near-
	infrared mapping spectrometer onboard NASA's Galileo
	spacecraft. Amirani is on the side of Io that permanently
	faces away from Jupiter. This image of Amirani was taken
	at a distance of less than 25,000 kilometers (16,000
	miles). The picture scale is approximately 6.5 kilometers
	(4 miles) per spectrometer pixel. The center and right
	images show views of Amirani as seen by the spectrometer
	at two wavelengths, 1.0 and 4.6 microns. These images can
	be compared with a visible wavelength image (on the left)
	of the same area obtained by Galileo's camera during a
	previous orbit. The visible light image shows extensive
	lava flows and a dark-floored caldera with associated
	bright red deposits of material fed from the volcano. The
	spectrometer observation was made in daylight. The center
	image, taken at a wavelength of 1 micron, shows light and
	dark areas on the surface that can be used to line up the
	spectrometer data with the camera image. The image on the
	right shows the same area at a wavelength of 4.6 microns,
	which reveals the thermal emission from three separate
	volcanic areas. The locations of these three "hot spots"
	correspond to the darkest features in the camera image,
	reinforcing a previously held belief by Galileo
	scientists that there is a correlation between the dark
	areas and the hot spots. The three spectrometer hot spots
	are located at the eastern edge of the caldera at the
	bottom of the camera image, and two locations along the
	massive Amirani flows. These are most likely active lava
	flows on the surface. Launched in October 1989, Galileo
	entered orbit around Jupiter on December 7, 1995 on a
	mission to study the giant planet, its largest moons and
	its magnetic environment. JPL manages the mission for
	NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. JPL is a
	division of the California Institute of Technology,
	Pasadena, CA. This image and other images and data
	received from Galileo are posted on the World Wide Web,
	on the Galileo mission home page at <a
	href="http://galile
	o.jpl.nasa.gov">http://galileo.jpl.nasa.gov</a>.
	Background information and educational context for the
	images can be found at <a
	href="http://galileo.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/io.cfm"
	class="external free"
	target="wpext">http://galileo.jpl.na
	sa.gov/gallery/io.cfm</a>.

	Date Published: 2009-10-14 05:11:13
	Identifier: PIA02516
	Item Size: 56808
	Media Type: image

	# Topics
	What -- Moon
	What -- Io
	What -- Near Infrared Mapping Spectro...
	What -- Spectrometer
	What -- Galileo
	What -- Jupiter
	What -- Visible Light
	Where -- Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)
	Where -- Washington
	Where -- California

	# Collections
	nasa
	planetaryphotojournalcollection

	# Uploaded by
	@bonniereal

	# Similar Items
	View similar items

	PHAROS