2022 IB Diploma Extended Essays

1 Introduction 1.1 Purpose

The moon Io has had scientists incorrectly predict where the volcanoes and volcanic activity would occur due to its heating processes. As well as this, the interior of Io and what layers are molten or solid has also been disputed in the past. An experiment to model how the molten layers would affect the location of the volcanic activity seemed interesting to me. Jupiter has a very large mass and therefore, a lot of gravitational force. Jupiter has up to 79 moons that have interesting qualities such as Io’s volcanism (Barnett, 2019). The moon is unique due to the amount of volcanic activity that occurs on it. I found an article 1.2 Research question To what extent does the orbital speed of Io influence the location and formation of volcanoes on the moon and how can it be modelled? And what is the relationship between the change in height of a liquid from its outermost point when experiencing centripetal force? Io is the third largest and innermost orbiting Galilean moon of Jupiter. The moon is the most volcanically active body in the solar system, some of its volcanoes spewing sulfurous plumes roughly 100km tall. Tidal forces occur in the magma ocean under the moons crust due to Jupiter’s gravity and the precisely timed pulls from Europa and Ganymede. Orbit and rotation The shape of Io’s orbit around Jupiter is an irregular elliptical one due to the close orbits of Europa and Ganymede. These varying distances cause the tidal forces, which can cause the surface to bulge in and out by as much as 100 meters. Io orbits Jupiter once every 42.5 hours, while Europa orbits every 85 hours and Ganymede every 170 hours. This means that it is in a 2:1 mean-motion orbital resonance with Europa and a 4:1 mean-motion orbital resonance with Ganymede. 1.3 Background research Io

Figure 1Jupiter's moons and Io's irregular orbit

3