Juno will, for the first time, see below Jupiter's dense cover of clouds. This is why the mission was named after the Roman goddess (right), who was Jupiter's wife, and who could also see through clouds.
The spacecraft will orbit Jupiter 33 times, skimming to within 3,100 miles (5,000 kilometers) above the planet's cloud tops every 11 days, for approximately one year.
The orbiter will use massive solar panels to power its suite of science instruments. Juno will be the first solar-powered spacecraft designed to operate at such a great distance from the sun.
Juno will be the second spacecraft to orbit Jupiter. A total of eight spacecraft have studied Jupiter.
The Juno mission is the second spacecraft designed under NASA's New Frontiers Program. The first was the Pluto New Horizons mission, launched in January 2006 and scheduled to reach Pluto's moon Charon in 2015.
