PIA09921: Shepherd Moons


Shepherd Moons

Caption:

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Shepherd Moons

The New Horizons spacecraft took the best images of Jupiter's charcoal-black rings as it approached and then looked back at Jupiter in February 2007. This sequence of pictures from the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) shows the well-defined lanes of gravel- to boulder-sized material composing the bulk of the rings; labels point out how these narrow rings are confined in their orbits by small "shepherding" moons (Metis and Adrastea).

Cataloging Keywords:

Name Value Additional Values
Target Jupiter Adrastea, Jupiter Rings, Metis
System Jupiter
Target Type Planet Ring, Satellite
Mission New Horizons
Instrument Host New Horizons
Host Type Flyby Spacecraft
Instrument Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI)
Detector
Extra Keywords Grayscale, Movie, Visual
Acquisition Date
Release Date 2007-05-01
Date in Caption
Image Credit NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
Source photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA09921
Identifier PIA09921