The
year is 2048. A tiny little dot is hurtling through space, making its descent
into the orbit of a moon half a billion miles from our sun. As its thrusters
slowly allow the heavy craft to alight on the -260 degree surface of this
frozen wasteland Jupiter’s swirling gases stare back at it ominously; daring it
to uncover the secrets she keeps buried miles below the surface.
The
little craft wastes no time going to work as it deploys the autonomous
exploratory robot Endurance. Using thermal technology he quickly bores his way
through the miles of ice and into the frigid untamed waters below. After
touching the bottom and finally proving what scientists have speculated for
decades, that it is indeed a rocky mantle with geothermic activity due to its
iron core, it activates its beacon and returns to the hole it bore in the
surface. When it gets back to the craft it syncs up and sends its astounding
data back to NASA, whatever it may be.
Whatever
it may be indeed…
If
NASA can hit this time frame, with a craft that not only survives the landing
onto this icy moon orbiting the gas giant Jupiter it doesn’t matter if they
find life or not to them. Just getting there was half of the accomplishment.
Right
now technology isn’t quite there for us to be able to not only just land on
Europa, but to drill through the ice without contaminating the specimens. Also,
once the ice is bored and a path to the liquid center is discovered will
Endurance be able to brave the sure to be insanely un-Earthlike temperatures
beneath the glacial ceiling? These questions, amongst others, are ones NASA is
hoping Vostok Station, and the pristine lake hidden beneath it can answer.
Universal Chaos
The
image pictured above is called Conamara Chaos. It refers to the structure of
the terrain on Europa. For a long time scientists have been trying to figure
out how the geological features of Europa had formed. With surface temperatures
being so cold and atmospheric conditions absent liquid water wouldn’t exist on
the surface. Also, if it was solely due to the strain of its elliptical orbit
around Jupiter than how would the scarring (which appears to have formed like
the veins in ice shelves where water has thawed and refrozen) have formed?
The
answer? They theorize that underneath that ice is liquid water. Beneath that
water are sub-glacial volcanoes erupting through the rocky mantle. The
volcanoes mean there is geothermic activity, which means it’s likely that the
moon has an iron core.
This
could also explain how the unique scarring on Europa’s surface had formed.
(Fig. 1)
Surface scarring of Europa, similar to ice shelf in Antarctica on Earth
(Fig 2)
Enhanced Satellite imaging of Wilkin’s Ice Shelf in Antarctica
No
that second image isn’t just an enhanced picture of Europa’s surface, that’s
right here on Earth. But it’s important to note the similarities in
topographical formation. See how it appears that some of the ice has melted and
refrozen, capturing larger untouched icebergs inside? That’s sort of how the
surface of Europa appears, so you can see why scientists for so long believed
the water had to have melted to cause the terrain to form like that.
However
what’s really going on is what they now believe is a combination of factors. As
the moon orbits Jupiter in its elliptical pattern it’s stretched out at certain
points in its rotation. This stretching causes friction within the core (which
as I stated before Europa’s core is believed to be much like our own) this
friction causes the geothermic activity (volcanoes). The ice above these
underwater explosives is heated, like Lake Vostok but not quite.
See
where the lake under Vostok is touching the rocky ground of the Ocean that isn’t
the case with these small geothermic lake formations. These little “pocket-lakes”
form near the surface, causing what’s called a “slush matrix” to form, not
quite thawed but not quite frozen. This creates a shifting, which when the
volcano beneath stops erupting quickly refreezes, causing the unique chaotic X
shaped patterns we see through our satellites lenses.
This
terrain, and its formation, is known accordingly as Chaos Terrain Theory. As
with most scientific articles this one isn’t particularly a riveting read, but
the information contained within may give you a better understanding of Chaos
Terrain Formation. You can read more here.
Europa
isn’t the only one out there of extreme interest to scientists, but with
everything going on in Antarctica right now it feels the most promising, that’s
why it’s garnered so much attention as of late. However we’re going to talk
about two planets in this article today. Jupiter and the Hula Hoop Champion of
the Universe, Saturn.
Jupiter
Many Moons Ago…
Jupiter
is quite the interesting planet floating around our humble little sun. It has
over 60 moons. In fact when you map their orbit and show their trajectories the
resulting pattern looks like the psychotic scribbling’s of a madman in the
depths of a methamphetamine withdrawal. Don’t believe me? See for yourself :
(Fig 3)
Jupiter and her moons. Orbital patterns are show in white tracings.
So
with all of this activity, and all of the residual energy being given off by
the gaseous reactions within their parent planet, it isn’t outside the realm of
probability that extremophiles have found a home out in the depths of space. We’ve
explored Europa, (So to speak) but now we’re going to briefly explore three of
her other moons briefly before heading over to Saturn to see what those rings
are made of.
Galileo Galilei
In
1610 when Galileo turned his telescope to the heaven’s there was no way he
could know that four centuries later we would be gearing up to search for life
on them. But he could see Jupiter, and because of the size of these four moons,
Galileo is actually credited with the discovery of these celestial bodies.
Those moons are:
·
Io
·
Ganymede
·
Callisto
·
Europa
For
the purposes of this article, Ganymede and Callisto are relatively unimportant.
The likelihood of either containing life is drastically reduced as there seems
to be no chemical reactions on either moon at present. Being their distance
from the sun is so great they contain little prospect. (However, they are
amazing heavenly bodies and are worth checking out if you find some extra
time.)
Io
on the other hand could be worth looking into as well. Active volcanoes seem to
shift magma around the surface. Even though beneath is a veritable molten hell
world however, the planet’s surface would still be rather cold where geothermic
activity isn’t taking place. But that’s not to say microbial life couldn’t
exist there, we’ve found organisms on our planet living in the lava in active
volcanic hotspots!
Don’t
count little Io out yet, it ain’t Pluto!
Saturn
The Planet, The
Moons, The Theory
Saturn,
like Jupiter, has many moons, 62 to be exact. The planet spins so fast it
actually looks like it’s getting pinched at the poles by some invisible force,
causing it to bulge into a spheroid. The average day on this fast moving gas
ball is around ten hours, and Saturn is probably the least dense planet in our
solar system. But what makes this planet truly a unique spectacle to behold,
its rings.
When
NASA sent spacecraft, Cassini, out by Saturn they discovered something
absolutely incredible. The rings weren’t asteroids, or gas, or one of the many
other things they had assumed them to be. No, the rings were made from chunks
of ice, free floating in an orbit around the gas ball. Some chunks were big as
a mountain; some chunks are smaller than a grain of sand, but it’s there! Super
frozen water!
But
like Jupiter, it’s highly unlikely there will be life in this extremely hostile
environment. It’s not to say this planet isn’t of interest to us still, just
not for those purposes.
What
is interesting, are her moons.
Titan
(Fig.
4) Titan and Geographical Landmarks
Titan:
the largest moon of Saturn, and in my opinion, the second most promising chance
we have of finding microbial life in our solar system beyond our own humble
planet. Clocking in at over a billion miles from our sun, the amount of
radiation he receives is significantly less than that of what we do but that’s
ok, because Titan has a totally different way of doing things anyway.
What
makes him so interesting to scientists is that for the longest time they were
baffled by what appeared to be liquid water on the surface. That couldn’t be
possible. Its distance from our sun suggests the temperature to be
approximately -290 degrees F and if Europa taught us anything, it’s that H2O
can’t sit in its liquid state at those temperatures. So this liquid couldn’t be
water, what was it?
Super
chilled methane and ethane. We have those here, (we even have some CRAZY
organisms that survive off that stuff which we’ll discuss soon!) but on Earth,
those two fuels are usually in a gaseous state. On Titan the stuff not only
creates liquid lakes (thousands of them!) it rains from the sky and literally
acts like water! From Cassini’s Saturn flybys we learned a lot the Hula Hooper
and her spectators. From intrepid explorers here on Earth, we recently
discovered that life can not only exist in these conditions, but thrive.
Titan
will continue to be of interest to scientists as we move forward into the
future but one of Saturn’s other moons helped gather the information to fuel
these scientifically driven excitements. Let’s see what else Saturn has to
offer us.
Enceladus
(Fig. 5) The Frozen Surface of Enceladus, Note
the Impact Craters and Scarring
When
Cassini flew by Enceladus in 2008, scientists were dumbfounded by what they
discovered there. You thought raining methane like water was strange? Enceladus
has sub-glacial cryo-volcanoes. Know what that means? Instead of lava they shoot
ice. That’s one chilly rock in the sky. Being around the same distance as Titan
and Saturn from the sun (around a billion miles) the surface, like Europa’s, is
a snowy, permafrost coated wasteland. But even with these even more extreme conditions, could life
persist? That’s what scientists are trying to find out. Unlike Europa though,
Enceladus’ chances of having liquid water beneath are much lower than that of
Jupiter’s frozen moon, but it’s still something we can’t rule out!
They
piloted Cassini through one of the Cryo-volcanic eruptions to gather ice and
snow particles. What they discovered was truly incredible. Hydrogen, carbon,
nitrogen, and many other elements floating around in there! The essential
building blocks of life were present even on what appeared to be a biologically
inert orb in space.
What’s
even better news? Unlike Europa it wouldn’t take months of planning and
billions of dollars in specialized equipment to gather exciting samples from
its surface. Just a scoop and a pail! Enceladus is covered in snow, that is
constantly replenished by the volcanoes. If microbes can survive the depths of
Mariana and Vostok then surely something could have evolved here!
So
now you know all I know about these planets. (Well maybe not all. But at least the most important
stuff.) Next we’re going to talk about some bizarre and hostile environments
that until a few years ago we didn't even know existed on our very own planet.
Wait until you meet these locals…
-Ryan
Sanders
From “Calvin and Hobbes” by the brilliant “Bill
Watterson”
For further reading on Europa, Io,
Titan, and Enceladus, you can follow any of the links below. Happy learning!
With the
potential for the discovery of life on another world there are also a plethora
of articles available on the internet (including Wikipedia which I've checked
and they have fairly accurate data). As always, I encourage you to continue
reading and to learn more about these mysterious worlds. After all, what could
be more exciting than alien life?
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