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| Small Bodies Mission Support |
Galileo launched on 18 October 1989 and began orbiting Jupiter in December 1995. During the outbound trip, Galileo flew by the asteroids (951) Gaspra, in October 1991, and (253) Ida, in August 1993. Images from the latter flyby revealed that Ida was itself orbited by a tiny moon, subsequently named Dactyl. This was the first known case of a solar system small body with its own natural satellite. Galileo was also positioned to observe the far side of Jupiter in July 1994, when the fragments of comet D/Shoemaker-Levy 9 impacted the planet. Once in orbit around Jupiter, Galileo dropped a probe to record the first direct observations of the Jovian atmosphere.
The original Galileo mission was extended into the Galileo Europa Mission, in which the spacecraft undertook an intensive study of the moon Europa, the Io plasma torus and Io itself. The mission ended on 21 September 2003, when the spacecraft descended into the Jovian atmosphere.
The Galileo Project web site is maintained by NASA/JPL. There is a separate home site for the atmospheric probe and its instruments, maintained by the NASA Ames Research Center.
The SBN, through its Interplanetary Dust Subnode and, in cooperation with the Planetary Plasma Interactions Node, is the contact PDS node archiving the Dust Detector System data both in the encounter and cruise phases.
| Instrument/Investigation | Measuring | Small Bodies Data available below |
|---|---|---|
| Dust Detector System (DDS) | Interplanetary and Jovian dust | DDS data, 1990-1997 |
| Energetic Particles Detector (EPD) | Charged particles in the immediate vicinity of Galileo | none |
| Extreme Ultraviolet Spectometer (EUV) | Volatile gases from Galilean satellites; upper Jovain atmosphere | none |
| Ultraviolet Spectrometer (UVS) | Gasses and aerosols in the Jovian atmosphere |
EDRs, SL9 impact Results, SL9 impact |
| Heavy Ion Counter (HIC) | Monitor environment for energetic heavy ions | none |
| Magnetometer (MAG) | Magnetic fields in the immediate vicinity of Galileo | none |
| Near-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (NIMS) | Spectral observations of Jupiter and its moons in the range 0.7-5.2 micrometers | SL9 Impact |
| Plasma Subsystem (PLS) | Low-energy plasma in the immediate vicinty of Galileo | none |
| Photopolarimeter-Radiometer (PPR) | Visible and IR observations of atmosphere | SL9 Impact |
| Plasma Wave Subsystem (PWS) | Electrostatic and electromagnetic 3D components of plasma waves | none |
| Solid State Imaging (SSI) | High-resolution visible light images | SL9 Impact |
| Radio Science | Microwave radio signal experiments | none |
| Instrument/ Investigation Description | Target | Description of Available Data | Data Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| DDS | Interplanetary Dust | Cruise and Jupiter data, 1990-1997 | On-line |
| MAG | (243) Ida, (951) Gaspra | Fly-by | On-line |
| NIMS | SL9 | SL9/Jupiter impact | CDROM |
| PPR | SL9 | SL9/Jupiter impact | CDROM |
| SSI | SL9 | SL9/Jupiter impact | CDROM |
| (243) Ida, (951) Gaspra | Fly-by images | ||
| UVS | SL9 | SL9/Jupiter impact, EDRs | CDROM |
| SL9/Jupiter impact, reduced data | CDROM |
| Target | Target Type | Other Data Sets Targeting this Object |
|---|---|---|
| Dust | Interplanetary Dust | Ulysses DDS: Results from the Ulysses Dust Detector System |
| D/Shoemaker-Levy 9 (SL9) | Comet | Shoemaker-Levy 9/Jupiter Impact CDROM archive |
| (243) Ida, (951) Gaspra | Asteroid | Ida/Gaspra Special Collection: Ground-based and Galileo data |