By peering into the hellish landscape of Io, a moon of Jupiter – the most volcanically active location in the Solar System – Cornell University astronomers have been able to study a fundamental process in the formation and evolution of planets: tidal heating.
“Tidal heating plays an important role in the heating and orbital evolution of celestial bodies,” said Alex Hayes, professor of astronomy. It provides the heat needed to form and maintain subsurface oceans on moons around giant planets like Jupiter and Saturn.”
“Studying the inhospitable landscape actually inspires science to look for life,” said lead author Madeline Pettine, a PhD student in astronomy.
The most active volcanic location in the Solar System
Examining flyby data from NASA’s Juno spacecraft, astronomers found that at its poles that could help regulate tidal heating—which causes friction—in its magma interior.
The research was published in
“Jupiter’s gravity is incredibly strong,” Pettine said. “Given the gravitational interactions with the big planet’s other moons, Io ends up being bullied, constantly stretched and crumpled. With this tidal deformation, a lot of heat is created inside the moon.”
A fundamental process in the formation and evolution of planets
Pettine discovered a surprising number of active volcanoes, unlike the more common equatorial regions. Interior oceans of liquid water from icy moons could be kept liquefied by tidal heating, Pettine said.
To the north, a group of four volcanoes—Asis, Zal, Tonatiuh, one unnamed, and an independent one called Loki—were very active and persistent, with a long history of space missions and ground observations.
A southern group, Kanehekili, Uta and Laki-Oi volcanoes have shown strong activity, writes .
The long-lived quartet of northern volcanoes simultaneously became bright and seemed to react to each other. “They all went bright and then went dark at a comparable rate,” Pettine said.
