This Is The Most Detailed Ever Image Of Jupiter's Icy Moon Europa

NASA has recreated a new high-resolution colour view of Europa using a mosaic of photos from the 1990s, showing how the moon would look to the human eye.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/SETI Institute

This detailed photo isn't CGI from an adventure space film, it's Jupiter's moon Europa, based on real pictures taken by NASA's Galileo spacecraft over a decade ago.

NASA has used photos gathered during the Galileo Solid-State Imaging (SSI) experiment in 1995 and 1998. The colours have been enhanced to create a complete image that resembles how the moon would look to a human observer.

NASA/JPL/University of Arizona / Via photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov

A previous remastered NASA image, using the same images from Galileo, released in 2001.

Near-infrared, green and violet filters were combined to create the realistic view. Gaps in the original image have been filled by NASA, using surrounding terrain and colours. The cracked surface is due to broken ice refreezing in different patterns, creating a terrain of criss-crossed ridges.

"Colour variations across the surface are associated with differences in geologic feature type and location. For example, areas that appear blue or white contain relatively pure water ice, while reddish and brownish areas include non-ice components in higher concentrations.

"The polar regions, visible at the left and right of this view, are noticeably bluer than the more equatorial latitudes, which look more white. This colour variation is thought to be due to differences in ice grain size in the two locations."

– Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, NASA