Publications by authors named "C P Paranicas"

Article Synopsis
  • - The Mapping Imaging Spectrometer for Europa (MISE) is an infrared instrument on NASA's Europa Clipper mission, aimed at understanding the composition and habitability of Europa's ocean and its icy surface.
  • - MISE will capture data from 0.8 to 5 μm with high spatial (25 m per pixel) and spectral resolution, helping identify critical components such as water ice, salts, acids, and organics on Europa's surface.
  • - This instrument, along with other Europa Clipper payloads, will enhance our knowledge of Europa's geological processes and surface structure, as detailed in the accompanying paper describing MISE's science goals, design, operations, and expected data products.
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The Juno spacecraft has been in orbit around Jupiter since 2016. Two flybys of Ganymede were executed in 2021, opportunities realized by evolution of Juno's polar orbit over the intervening 5 years. The geometry of the close flyby just prior to the 34th perijove pass by Jupiter brought the spacecraft inside Ganymede's unique magnetosphere.

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Observations of energetic neutral atoms (ENAs) are a useful tool for analyzing ion and neutral abundances in planetary magnetospheres. They are created when hot plasma, originating for example from magnetic reconnection sites, charge-exchanges with the ambient neutral population surrounding the planet. The motion of ENAs is not governed by the magnetic field, allowing remote imaging.

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At Jupiter, tail reconnection is thought to be driven by an internal mass loading and release process called the Vasyliunas cycle. Galileo data have shown hundreds of reconnection events occurring in Jupiter's magnetotail. Here we present a survey of reconnection events observed by Juno during its first 16 orbits of Jupiter (July 2016-October 2018).

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On 10 January 2001, Cassini briefly entered into the magnetosphere of Jupiter, en route to Saturn. During this excursion into the Jovian magnetosphere, the Cassini Magnetosphere Imaging Instrument/Charge-Energy-Mass Spectrometer detected oxygen and sulfur ions. While Charge-Energy-Mass Spectrometer can distinguish between oxygen and sulfur charge states directly, only 95.

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