Scientists Find Water on Saturn Moon

by bavman 10 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  bavman

  The Cassini spacecraft has found evidence of liquid water spewing from geysers on one of Saturn's icy moons, raising the tantalizing possibility that the celestial object harbors life.

  The surprising discovery excited some scientists, who say the Saturn moon, Enceladus, should be added to the short list of places within the solar system most likely to have extraterrestrial life.

  Recent high-resolution images snapped by the orbiting Cassini confirmed the eruption of icy jets and giant water vapor plumes from geysers resembling frozen Old Faithfuls at Enceladus' south pole.

  "We have the smoking gun" that proves the existence of water, said Carolyn Porco, a Cassini imaging scientist from the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

  If Enceladus does harbor life, it probably consists of microbes or other primitive organisms capable of living in extreme conditions, scientists say.

  The findings were published in Friday's issue of the journal Science.

  David Morrison, a senior scientist at NASA's Astrobiology Institute, cautioned against rushing to judgment about whether the tiny moon could support life. Scientists generally agree habitats need several ingredients for life to emerge, including water, a stable heat source and the right chemical recipe.

  "It's certainly interesting, but I don't see how much more you can say beyond that," Morrison said.

  Scientists believe Mars and Jupiter's icy moons might have or once had conditions hospitable to life.

  Saturn is around 800 million miles from Earth. Enceladus measures 314 miles across and is the shiniest object in the solar system.

  It was long thought to be cold and still. But scientists now believe it is a geologically active moon that possesses an unusually warm south pole.

  The water is believed to vent from fissures in the south pole. Porco said the venting has probably been going on for at least several thousand years, potentially providing a lasting heat source.

  The Cassini-Huygens mission is a joint NASA-European Space Agency project. The spacecraft was launched in 1997 and went into orbit around Saturn in 2004, exploring its spectacular rings and many moons. Cassini made three flybys of Enceladus last year and is expected to fly within 220 miles of the moon again in 2008.

  On the Net:

  Cassini mission: http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.cfm
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  observador

  Thanks for sharing the story.
  
  "David Morrison, a senior scientist at NASA's Astrobiology Institute, cautioned against rushing to judgment about whether the tiny moon could support life. Scientists generally agree habitats need several ingredients for life to emerge, including water, a stable heat source and the right chemical recipe."
  
  That's what I like in serious scientists doing serious scientific work.
  
  However, the prospect of even microscopic form of life there is exciting indeed.
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  juni

  Thanks bavman. My husband is SO into this stuff. He read your post.

  Juni
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  cosmic

  Saturn is such a bizarre place. I've always thought that if I were going to leave something somehwre, I'd leave it well marked. Saturn is a definitive location within our solar system

  This comming January may prove really interesting as Cassini does another fly by of Iapetus. I'm not pro or con on this, but it is an interesting read:

  http://www.enterprisemission.com/moon1.htm
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  cosmic

  Oh yeah, I pulled this pic off another site while I was looking around today. Most interesting. It is a pic from Iapetus showing a monolith. If I can get the thing to show up.
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  Midget-Sasquatch

  I would love to see the day when (even microbial) life was confirmed on another celestial sphere. Thank you bavman for the interesting post.

  Thanx to you too cosmic, for linking to Richard Hoagland's website. I didn't realize he was still chasing this angle. Not that I'd take much stock in anything he says. I see I haven't really missed anything new. Hoagland jumped on the bandwagon with The Face on Mars, then he continued with hunting down supposed alien structures like the Martian "city" at Cydonia, and he even was swearing there were structures on our moon.
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  Leolaia

  I remember the Voyager flyby of Jupiter in 1979 and I used to clip out newspaper articles of the mission into a scapbook. One of them discussed the possibility of life on Europa in an undersea ocean. That was way back in 1979. Then years later there was the Galileo mission in the '90s and all of sudden ppl were talking again about this, as if it were a new discovery or new idea. So I went back to that old scrapbook to find that old article. It was quoted a "Richard Hoagland" of NASA as the source of this speculation. That quite surprised me. At the time, I was a regular listener of Art Bell (loved that old show!) and heard Hoagland's speculations of "structures on the Moon" many times. Thought it was funny that one of his older speculations became widely adopted while he was pursuing something so unorthodox...
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  Midget-Sasquatch

  Leolaia

  I had to smile about that reference to Hoagland in 1979. Thats a funny find. I don't distinctly remember following the Jupiter flyby, but I definitely followed the Saturn flyby. I got the National Geographic on it with the photosupplement. It also had a small writeup on its moon Titan and how life may be possible on it. Wish I still had that issue, if anything just to see if Richard was mentioned in there too.
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  xjwms

  Well.......

  You did always like science............did'nt you?
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  Lapuce

  I'm familiar with Saturn, I drive one loll...