EPSC Abstracts
Vol. 18, EPSC-DPS2025-158, 2025, updated on 09 Jul 2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/epsc-dps2025-158
EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting 2025
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
The Juno 2nd Extended Mission
Scott Bolton
Scott Bolton
  • San Antonio, United States of America (scott.bolton@swri.org)

Juno has transformed our view of Jupiter through major discoveries about its interior structure, origin, and evolution; atmospheric dynamics and composition; magnetic dynamo; and polar magnetosphere. The natural evolution of Juno’s polar orbit brings new regions within reach with every close passage to Jupiter, as the inbound equator crossing marches ever closer to the giant planet. The 1st extended mission began in August 2021 and provided the first close flybys of Io, Europa and Ganymede since the Galileo mission.  The second extended mission (EM2) begins in October 2025 and last 3 years.  The new mission provides opportunities for Juno to unexplore new regions in the Jovian system, and to follow up on Juno’s discoveries made during its prime and 1st extended missions.  The Juno spacecraft and instruments are in excellent health. During EM2, Juno will dive deep within Jupiter's inner radiation belts where the rings and inner moons reside. EM2 provides an opportunity for a thorough investigation of these components and their complex interaction, providing a unique data set to compare with other giant planet ring systems, including the ice giants. The migration of the periapsis northward creates an opportunity to explore in-situ Jupiter's ring-moon system, investigate Jupiter’s northern hemisphere and the unexplored regions of Jupiter's distant southern magnetospheric boundaries. During EM2, Juno’s polar perijoves will provide the opportunity to continue the exploration of Jupiter’s circumpolar cyclones over a wide range of altitudes/depths via imagery, occultations and microwave sounding. Radio science occultations will icharacterize the upper atmosphere to levels as deep as 0.5 bar. EM2 gravity passes over the north polar region will constrain the depth and mass of the polar cyclones and will also be compared to MWR's sounding of the same..  Juno’s 2nd extended mission proposal is currently being reviewed.  An overview of the new opportunities provided with EM2 will be presented. 

How to cite: Bolton, S.: The Juno 2nd Extended Mission, EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting 2025, Helsinki, Finland, 7–12 Sep 2025, EPSC-DPS2025-158, https://doi.org/10.5194/epsc-dps2025-158, 2025.