Highlights o' the Week

It has been a busier week than usual thanks the Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference, quite a few images added to my Galileo Io Images website, and some news on the New Frontiers 3 front.

• Seven presentations on Io were displayed at a poster session on Tuesday night in League City, Texas. Overviews of each abstract and other LPSC news are collected here.
• I finished a large mosaic from Galileo orbit I27 covering the Chaac-Camaxtli region of Io. Both clear-filter and one combined with lower-resolution C21 color data versions are available.
• Reprocessing of images from E11 revealed two eruptions columns for a Prometheus-type plume at Kanehekili that I don't recall having been mentioned before.
• The Space Sciences Board released their recommendations for the slate of missions for the next New Frontiers Announcement of Opportunity. One of the mission profiles recommended is an Io Observer. Such a mission would have to do its observations without RTGs as an energy source. This greatly limits the ability for an Io Observer to accomplish the scientific goals outlined by the SSB. This would make such a mission less attractive than the other mission profiles that can be accomplished just fine with solar power.

Enjoy the weekend! I got to get back to playing Halo 3 (yeah, I've gotten a little tired of playing Guitar Hero 3 for the time being).