Auroras on Jupiter's giant moon Ganymede look like Earth's northern lights, NASA spacecraft reveals

Blue stripe-like features shown in pairs going vertically against a black background.

A fleeting flyby of Ganymede has revealed that its shimmering auroras may behave far more like Earth's than scientists expected.

During a close pass on July 7, 2021, NASA's Juno spacecraft captured the most detailed ultraviolet views yet of a Jovian moon's glowing polar lights. The new analysis, completed by a team led by the Laboratory of Atmospheric and Planetary Physics (LPAP) at the the University of Liège, shows that Ganymede's auroras are not smooth, continuous ovals. Instead, they splinter into small, bright patches — structures that mirror features seen in Earth's own auroral displays.