This Week on Galileo
June 21-27, 1999
The spacecraft spends some time this week preparing for next week's encounter, thus interrupting data return. On Wednesday, playback is paused to perform a gyroscope performance test. On Friday, it is interrupted to perform a small adjustment to the spacecraft's flight path.
This week's playback is a continuation of the second pass through the recorded data. This second pass allows the replay of data lost in transmission to Earth, reprocessing of data using different parameters, or return of additional new data. The data returned this week are from observations made by the Solid-State Imaging camera and Near-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer.
The Solid-State Imaging camera returns observations of three different types of terrain on Callisto. The first contains images of a dark flow. The second is a set of images that will allow scientists to gather statistics on the size distribution of impact craters, which will allow them to more accurately estimate the age of the surface of Callisto. And the third is an imge of Bran Crater, a young, single-ring impact crater. The formation of Bran excavated rock from deep beneath the surface and thus provides a window into the structure and composition of Callisto's crust.
The Near-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer also returns observations of Callisto this week. They all contain measurements that will allow scientists to determine the chemical composition of different regions of Callisto's surface. Three observations are regional in scale, one is global, and one captures data from Bran crater and its surroundings.
For more information on the Galileo spacecraft and its mission to Jupiter, please visit the Galileo home page.
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