Jupiter (Planet) -- Photographs from space; Jupiter probes; Voyager Project
Although Callisto was heavily covered with craters up to 200 kilometers
in diameter, Dr. Soderblom commented on the absence of larger impact
basins. Perhaps there was one in the huge bullseye feature; however, it
was not a “standard” looking basin like those on the Moon. Callisto was
“extremely smooth and free of any relief. The structure [the bullseye],
if impact caused, shows no relief; the limb does not show any relief;
maybe it’s possible that Callisto cannot support relief.” By the next
day, the geologists on the Imaging Team were becoming more convinced
that the Callisto “bullseye” was the frozen remnant of an enormous
impact into Callisto’s surface. Since Callisto is composed in large part
of water and has an icy crust, the team speculated that any raised
features created by the impact would eventually “slide” back into the
surface, “and the ripple marks from the shock wave caused by the impact
were frozen” into the surface.
[Illustration: Callisto was the last of the Galilean satellites to
be studied by Voyager 1. In this photo, taken March 5 from a
distance of 1.2 million kilometers, with a resolution of about 25
kilometers, the extensive cratering of the surface began to be
apparent. Near the upper left edge is the large impact basin
Valhalla; the numerous light spots are craters 100 kilometers or
more in diameter. This is the same side of Callisto that was
photographed at higher resolution during the Voyager 1 flyby of the
satellite a day later. [P-21284C]]
Lyle Broadfoot announced that the ultraviolet spectrometer had detected
very strong auroral emission in Jupiter’s north and south polar regions.
The aurora seemed to be caused primarily by the excitation of molecular
hydrogen, although some atomic hydrogen was also detected. Auroral
emissions from helium atoms were not detected.
[Illustration: The largest ancient impact basin on Callisto is
called Valhalla. The central light area is about 600 kilometers
across. Surrounding it is a set of concentric low ridges, looking
like frozen ripple marks, extending about 1500 kilometers from the
center. This picture was taken by Voyager 1 on March 6 at a range of
350 000 kilometers. [P-21287C]]
The IRIS infrared measurements required more computer processing than
other Voyager data, and therefore they were not available until a day or
two after the observations were made. However, Rudy Hanel already had
two new results to report. First, the Great Red Spot was about 3° C
cooler than its surroundings, and this cooling extended many kilometers
above the clouds, into the thin upper atmosphere. Second, the thermal
emission from Io was peculiar, with an unexpected shape to the spectrum.
Tentatively, Hanel suggested there might be some hot spots on the
surface of the satellite.
Jupiter has been full of surprises, but the excitement was far from
over. Major discoveries were yet to be made.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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