Science Objectives of NASA's Europa Clipper Mission
This graphic illustrates the main science objectives of NASA's Europa Clipper mission to Jupiter's moon Europa: to understand the nature of Europa's icy shell and confirm the existence of a subsurface ocean, investigate Europa's composition, characterize its geology, and determine the level of activity, such as possible water plumes.
Clockwise from top left: an artist's concept of Europa's interior, which likely contains a global ocean beneath the icy surface, with possible hydrothermal activity on the ocean floor; water signatures at Europa's Manannán Crater made visible by mapping colors onto infrared data from NASA's Galileo mission to Jupiter; ultraviolet observations by the Hubble Space Telescope showing evidence of a possible plume at Europa and indicating possible activity at the moon; and a color view of Europa's Conamara Chaos region based on an image from NASA's Galileo mission.
Europa Clipper's three main science objectives are to determine the thickness of the moon's icy shell and its interactions with the ocean below, to investigate its composition, and to characterize its geology. The mission's detailed exploration of Europa will help scientists better understand the astrobiological potential for habitable worlds beyond our planet.
Managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory leads the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with APL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. APL designed the main spacecraft body in collaboration with JPL and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. The Planetary Missions Program Office at Marshall executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission.
NASA's Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy, manages the launch service for the Europa Clipper spacecraft, which will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy.
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