NASA’s Juno mission to Jupiter unravels some of the planet's mysteries

26 May, 2017 22:10

NASA’s mission to Jupiter has yielded its first science results, revealing the complexity and turbulent world of the solar system's largest planet. RT takes a look at some of the highlights from the Juno probe.

Juno was launched in August 2011 and entered Jupiter’s orbit July 4 of last year. It has been collecting data and information on the mysterious planet ever since.

The spacecraft is currently in a polar orbit around the planet, meaning that the majority of each orbit is spent at a huge distance from the gas giant.

However, once every 53 days its trajectory approaches Jupiter from above it’s north pole and that’s when things get seriously interesting.

Jupiter’s mysteries are shrouded in an unfathomable amount of gas but Juno has a trick up its sleeve - cloud-piercing instruments that have revealed at least some of the planet's secrets.