Juno Mission to Jupiter Will Explore Planet Up Close (PHOTOS)
The Juno spacecraft was launched Friday from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida and is currently en route to Jupiter.
With the help of the Atlas 5 rocket, the shuttle took off at 12:25 p.m. ET after a short delay due to a helium leak within the rocket. It will reach Jupiter in about five years.
"Today, with the launch of the Juno spacecraft, NASA began a journey to yet another new frontier," said NASA's administrator Charles Bolden.
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"The future of exploration includes cutting-edge science like this to help us better understand our Solar System and an ever-increasing array of challenging destinations."
The Juno Jupiter mission is the first solar-powered endeavor to travel this far from the Sun. Now launched, Juno is heading to Mars, where it will essentially "sling-shot" around the red planet in order to gain enough momentum and speed to reach Jupiter. In this maneuver, Juno will do an "Earth fly-by" in 2013, and reach Jupiter in 2016.
Juno will spend approximately a year orbiting the gas giant, collecting information about its origin and creation as well as discovering what lies below its dense atmosphere.
NASA scientist Steven Leven told BBC News in an interview that the main aim of the Juno mission is to try "to understand is what lies beneath the clouds."
"Because when you look at Jupiter it’s this enormous giant planet," he said. "It's 300 times the mass of the Earth - it can hold more than 1000 Earths, but all we can see is the tops of the clouds in its enormous atmosphere. We don't have much information about what's underneath."
Added Leven, "We've been studying Jupiter for hundreds of years. It's one of the very first things anyone looked at with a telescope. The problem is its enormous and it's got a huge layer of clouds and atmosphere that are hard to see through."
Scientists feel that studying Jupiter will unlock many secrets about the creation and evolution of the solar system.
The Juno mission's lead scientist Scott Bolton explained that Jupiter is made up of the "leftovers" of the gas and dust that created the sun. This could explain why the planet has a gargantuan mass, which is twice the mass of all other bodies in the solar system combined. Scientists suggest that Jupiter's gravity had a large influence in the development of the inner solar system.
In addition, Juno will attempt to analyze whether Jupiter has a dense and rocky core and will also get a closer look at the great red spot, which is a monstrous storm that has endured for hundreds of years. Scientists anticipate observing a liquid metallic nitrogen ocean on the planet's surface that is thought to be associated with its magnetic pull.
The Juno spacecraft will also test how well NASA equipment can handle the elements in the vicinity of the outer planets. In the Jupiter region, the solar powered craft will be five times further than Earth is and receive just 1/25 the solar energy. Juno is equipped with three panels coated with 18,000 solar cells in order to take in power.
"As a solar-paneled mission, we have to keep those solar panels facing the Sun and we never go into Jupiter's shadow," Bolton told BBC News.
Juno will orbit Jupiter's poles as opposed to its equator in order to have optimal access to solar energy.
