Europa Clipper Camera Passes First Test in Space
Soon after NASA's Europa Clipper spacecraft launched toward Jupiter's icy moon on Oct. 14, 2024, the mission team powered on each of the science instruments for a series of test or "checkout" activities. The Europa Imaging System – with its narrow-angle and wide-angle cameras – underwent its first checkouts in December 2024.
Each camera has a cover to protect its sensitive detectors from the Sun while the spacecraft moves through the inner solar system, so the test images only show low-level variations in the sensitivity of the detector system. This image, taken by the narrow-angle camera (or NAC), has been enhanced to show more subtle variations in brightness. The pattern shown here matched similar test images taken before launch, confirming the camera is working as expected.
The large, 8-megapixel detectors are divided into 16 sections to capture data quickly during the very fast, low-altitude flybys of Europa. Each section has a slightly different background brightness level, which gives it the image a striped appearance. Images like this are used to correct the background pattern in science observations.
Instrument scientists and engineers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), where the camera was designed and built, will use images like this to calibrate the science imagery it eventually gathers above Europa. The team also, for the first time in flight, moved the gimbal that will allow the NAC to target specific locations on Europa.
In 2027, the spacecraft will be far enough from the Sun to safely open the lens covers and capture the first images, which will of starfields until arrival at the Jupiter system in 2030.
Learn more about the Europa Imaging System.
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 led the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The main spacecraft body was designed by APL in collaboration with JPL and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. The Planetary Missions Program Office at Marshall executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission.
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