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Abstract:

JUICE is a planetary probe on its way to Jupiter. Launched in April by the European Space agency, JUICE carries a diverse payload of instruments with the primary targets the icy moons of Jupiter: Ganymede, Callisto and Europa. Coated with ice-rich crustal shells, the moons are believed to contain vast interior zones of liquid water, making them potential abodes for life.

One of the key instruments on JUICE is RIME, the Radar for Icy Moon Exploration. Building on experience from terrestrial ice sheets and orbital instruments at Mars, RIME will use radar sounding to probe kilometers deep into the moons' icy crusts. The RIME radar is a joint project between the space agencies of Italy and the U.S. with key components designed and built at JPL. The lecture will describe the JUICE mission, its scientific goals, and provide details about the RIME experiment, already underway during the interplanetary cruise phase.

Speaker's Biography:

Jeffrey Plaut is a Senior Research Scientist and Project Scientist at JPL. He has participated in numerous planetary and Earth projects, including Magellan at Venus, the Shuttle Imaging Radars, 2001 Mars Odyssey, Mars Express, and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. He is the Co-Principal Investigator on the RIME experiment on JUICE and and a Deputy Investigator on its sister instrument REASON on JPL's Europa Clipper mission.