NASA's Juno spacecraft is about to make the closest pass to Jupiter it's ever make during its primary mission. The satellite will draw within a mere 2,500 miles of the King of Planets, a figure thats' less than the distance across the continental United States.

Launched in 2011 to gain a better understanding of Jupiter's role in the formation of the solar system, Juno has been mapping the planet's gravitational and magnetic fields and measuring the variations of temperature and cloud opacity at different locales. Juno has already made 38 flybys since it arrived on the Fourth of July, but on August 27 it will be, for the first time, close enough to use all its scientific equipment simultaneously.

Getting this close to Jupiter is unprecedented, and it's a fact that will slow down the release of scientific information gained. While the data will only take a few days to get to Earth, no other "spacecraft has ever orbited Jupiter this closely, or over the poles in this fashion," says Steve Levin, Juno project scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "This is our first opportunity and there are bound to be surprises. We need to take our time to make sure our conclusions are correct."

In addition to its eight scientific instruments, Juno's visible light imager, the JunoCam, will be up and running, catching a few pictures of the historic achievement.

Source: JPL

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