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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.

See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.

Io Eclipse Shadow on Jupiter from Juno

Explanation: What's that dark spot on Jupiter? It's the shadow of Jupiter 's most volcanic moon Io . Since Jupiter shines predominantly by reflected sunlight, anything that blocks that light leaves a shadow . If you could somehow be in that shadow, you would see a total eclipse of the Sun by Io . Io 's shadow is about 3600 kilometers across, roughly the same size as Io itself -- and only slightly larger than Earth's Moon . The featured image was taken last month by NASA's robotic Juno spacecraft currently orbiting Jupiter. About every two months, Juno swoops close by Jupiter, takes a lot of data and snaps a series of images -- some of which are made into a video . Among many other things , Juno has been measuring Jupiter's gravitational field, finding surprising evidence that Jupiter may be mostly a liquid. Under unexpectedly thick clouds, the Jovian giant may house a massive liquid hydrogen region that extends all the way to the center.

Date October 7, 2019
Credit Image Credit & License: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS ; Processing: Kevin M. Gill
Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U.