GANYMEDE – Largest Galilean Moon | Moons Of Jupiter
GANYMEDE – We are now going to know and learn about one of the Galilean moons of Jupiter, the largest Galilean moon known as Ganymede.
As mentioned above, it is the largest moon of Jupiter, which is even larger than Pluto or Mercury but smaller than Mars.
It is also the seventh and third Galilean moon that orbits around 665K miles or 1.07 kilometers away from the planet and takes seven Earth days to orbit around it, according to Space.
It is also, by far, the only satellite in the Solar System to have its own magnetosphere or basically, its gravity.
Like the other two Galilean moons, it was discovered by Galileo Galilei on the year 1610. The discovery led to the understanding that planets orbit around the Sun and not the Earth itself.
The moon was named after the cup bearer of the gods and lover of Zeus, who is also the former Trojan prince.
The moon’s core is composed of metallic iron followed by a rock layer covered in a crust of mostly thick ice. There are also bumps on the surface, which are said to be rock formations.
It is also believed that it has a saltwater ocean below its surface based on the changes of the moon’s auroras as cited from a 2015 study by the Hubble Space Telescope.
As the largest moon, its mean radius is 1,635 miles or 2,631.2 kilometers.
