PASADENA, CALIFORNIA — NASA’s Juno spacecraft is set to arrive at Jupiter on July 4 in a mission to study how the gas giant was formed and evolved. <br /> <br />The spacecraft was launched on August 5, 2011 and will enter orbit around Jupiter after a nearly five-year journey. <br /> <br />Juno will fire its main engine for 35 minutes during a dramatic insertion maneuver. The gravitational pull of Jupiter will make the spacecraft travel faster and faster until it reaches a speed of over 250,000 kilometers per hour, making it the fastest human-made object ever. <br /> <br />If it survives the maneuver, it will orbit Jupiter 37 times over the next 20 months, flying as close as within 5,000 kilometers above the planet’s cloud tops. <br /> <br />Juno’s mission includes studying the composition, temperature and water content of Jupiter's atmosphere. It will also study the planet’s auroras and magnetic and gravity fields. <br /> <br />Juno has surpassed European Space Agency’s Rosetta as the most distant solar-powered spacecraft from Earth. <br /> <br />The Juno mission has cost a total of $1.13 billion. The spacecraft will de-orbit and crash into Jupiter after it completes its mission.
