APOD
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
Io Rotating
Explanation: The surface of Io is continually changing. Jupiter's moon is the home to many powerful volcanoes so active they are effectively turning the moon inside out. The above time-lapse sequence is a composite of images taken during two space missions that approached the violent moon: Voyager and Galileo . The sequence shows Io during a complete rotation, which corresponds to a complete revolution around Jupiter since Io always keeps the same face toward the giant planet. The rampant volcanism is thought to be caused by Jupiter's more distant Galilean Moons ( Europa , Ganymede , and Callisto ) pulling on Io and continually distorting its shape, causing internal frictional heating. Io is composed mostly of rock, with the yellow color originating from sulfur . The causes of many of the other colors remain a topic of research .
| Date | October 24, 2000 |
|---|---|
| Credit | Credit & Copyright: Calvin J. Hamilton , Voyager Team, Galileo Team , NASA |
| Authors & editors: | Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP) |
| A service of: |
ASD at NASA / GSFC, NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U. |



