The psychedelic new image from NASA’s visit to Europe last week is just one of some beautiful artwork inspired by Jupiter

After NASA’s Juno spacecraft’s incredibly close flyby of Jupiter’s moon Europa on September 29, 2022, there was a flood of incredible images.

While some are created by NASA itself, most were the work of a dedicated and creative team of volunteer image processors. Perhaps most notable was this image (above) by citizen scientist Fernando Garcia Navarro, who downloaded and processed an image his colleague Kevin M. Gill had previously worked on, creating a psychedelic rendering titled “Fall Colors of Europa.”

Orbiting the giant planet since 2016, NASA’s Juno spacecraft has been sending back amazing new images every six weeks. They are made available free of charge for citizen scientists and image researchers to download, remix and then upload to either social media and/or the Juno Mission gallery.

There you’ll find incredible images of Jupiter’s bands, clouds, mesmerizing storms, and even its four giant moons. Some of the best are Jupiter’s “racing stripes,” its massive jet stream, a classic “Jupiter Marble” portrait, and a “churned up” Jupiter.

However, you will also find something else – art.

Remixed, combined, colored and generally tinkered around, the end results over the last few years have been great.

“Starting with our 2013 Earth flyby, Juno’s citizen scientists have been invaluable in processing the numerous images we receive with Juno,” said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator of the Southwest Research Center in San Antonio. “During each flyby of Jupiter and now its moons, their work offers a perspective that draws on both science and art. They are a crucial part of our team and lead the way by using our imagery for new discoveries.”

Juno has been in an elliptical polar orbit near Jupiter since July 5, 2016 to probe the planet’s atmosphere and magnetosphere. It spends most of its time off-planet taking measurements.

Any dip near Jupiter is denoted as an a period, which is Greek for the extreme points in the orbit of one body around another. During its brief flyby, it gets very close to the planet’s cloud tops for some amazing photos.

The spacecraft’s JunoCam snaps images as it spins with its simple two-megapixel camera with a 58° field of view. JunoCam is the world’s first outreach camera. It sends its images back to Earth via NASA’s Deep Space Network.

Some of the images show the “Great Red Spot,” a 400-year-old storm twice the size of Earth and easily the largest in the solar system. Its winds can be up to 425 miles per hour.

Others show Jupiter’s four largest moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, which Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei first saw through his homemade telescope in January 1610.

Juno is part of NASA’s New Frontiers missions. It was launched on August 5, 2011 on an Atlas V rocket and reached Jupiter in July 2016. It is now on an extended mission and should be operational by the mid to late 2020s.

Juno’s next close flyby of Jupiter, period 46, taking place on November 6, 2022.

I wish you clear skies and big eyes.