April 1, 2025

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Speaker: Anton Ermakov, Assistant Professor, Aeronautics & Astronautics, Stanford University.

Host: Brandon Jones

Title: Juno’s Exploration of Ganymede, Europa and Io.

Abstract: Juno mission was designed to study Jupiter. But, over time, the torque from the Sun and Jupiter’s oblateness rotated Juno’s orbit, allowing the investigation of Jupiter’s satellite system, which was the primary objective of Juno’s extended mission. The Juno spacecraft performed close and distant flybys of Ganymede, Europa, and Io between 2021 and 2024. The data collected during these flybys provided unprecedented views of these Jovian moons. In this talk, I will focus on Juno’s multi-instrument view into the internal structure of Jovian moons using microwave radiometry, gravitational sounding and high-resolution imagery from Juno. I will describe how these datasets allow drawing comparisons between surface and subsurface properties of Ganymede, Europa and Io. Finally, I will outline how the new Juno data can help analyze and interpret the data from future Europa Clipper and JUICE missions.

Biography:

Prof. Ermakov’s research lies at the intersection of planetary science and planetary exploration by robotic means and focuses on studying Solar System bodies ranging from asteroids to gas giants. In his research, Dr. Ermakov combines a range of spacecraft data (e.g., spacecraft radiometric tracking, stereo-imaging, magnetometry, microwave radiometry and geologic mapping) with geophysical and orbital dynamics modeling to probe the interiors and histories of the Solar System bodies.

Dr. Ermakov received an Engineering Degree in Space Geodesy from the Moscow State University of Geodesy and Cartography in 2010 and a Ph.D. in Planetary Sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2017. After receiving his doctorate degree, Dr. Ermakov was a post-doctoral scholar at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and at the Earth and Planetary Science Department of the University of California, Berkeley. In 2021 to 2023, Dr. Ermakov was a research scientist at UC Berkeley’s Space Sciences Lab. Currently, Dr. Ermakov is an Assistant Professor of Aeronautics & Astronautics with courtesy appointments in Geophysics and Earth & Planetary Sciences departments at Stanford.