Europe's Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) spacecraft will set out on an ambitious explorative tour of Jupiter's moons next week. But the mission will only take the briefest glimpse of the potentially life-harboring moon Europa. Here's why.
Surviving on as little power as half a hair dryer and featuring a "nuclear bunker" to shelter its electronics from radiation, Europe's Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is a technological marvel that wouldn't survive at Europa for long. The smallest of Jupiter's four main moons may be the likeliest place in the solar system to host extraterrestrial life in its ice-covered ocean; the environment around the moon, however, is so harsh, that it would kill a spacecraft in a couple of months at best, according to NASA.
