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Judi Lynn

(160,218 posts)
Sun Sep 16, 2018, 09:13 PM Sep 2018

Jupiter's Icy Moon Europa Has a Really Weird Cold Spot


By Meghan Bartels, Space.com Senior Writer | September 7, 2018 12:19pm ET

Just because Jupiter's moon Europa is coated in ice doesn't mean all that ice is the same temperature.

And now, scientists have mapped the hot and cold spots on the moon's surface using data gathered from Earth, with accuracy down to 125 miles (200 kilometers). While most of the temperature variations they measured can be explained by sunlight's influence on the ice, there's one unusually cold spot that is stumping the scientists behind the new research.

That spot, which falls on the moon's northern hemisphere, stood out in images taken at different times of the day, which surprised the scientists. They weren't sure what might be causing the local coldness and didn't know of any geologic features there that could be responsible.

Probably unrelated but nevertheless intriguing is a coincidence on the opposite side of the moon: an unusually warm area at Pwyll crater, which is one of the youngest impacts on the moon. That made more sense to the team, they wrote in their paper about the research, because scientists know that craters on other solar system bodies tend to retain heat compared to their surroundings.

More:
https://www.space.com/41739-europa-hot-cold-spots-stump-scientists.html
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