Hidden depths

• Autores: Joshua Sokol
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 3086, 2016, págs. 29-33
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Sokol talks about the search for oceans inside distant icy moons. Jupiter's moon Europa, and Enceladus, which orbits Saturn, both have vast oceans secreted beneath their frozen outer shells. As such, many astroblologists consider them humans' best bet in the search for life beyond Earth, NASA is plotting life-finding missions there. The first hints of Europa's concealed sea came from the Voyager probes, which explored Jupiter back in the 1970s. The case for a sea on Enceladus washed in more recently. In 2005 the Cassini probe detected ammonia, which acts as an antifreeze to keep water flowing even at low temperatures. All the signs suggested this was a sea of liquid water, stocked with at least some of the building blocks of life