Jupiter’s moon Europa: Lake theory boosts hopes for life

[No Joe]

Source: Washington Post

Of all the geological mysteries of the solar system — and they are legion — perhaps none hold as much intrigue as huge piles of jumbled-up icebergs strewn across the cracked and mottled surface of Europa, Jupiter’s ice-locked moon.

A new theory explains these vast “chaos terrains” as the tips of subsurface lakes that well up and warm the surface. The existence of such lakes would thrill scientists seeking life beyond Earth, a group long drawn to Europa.

“Europa has the best chance of having life there today,” said Britney Schmidt, who studies the moon at the University of Texas at Austin and led the new study appearing in the journal Nature.

Such lakes could provide a habitat for life or act as channels for organic compounds on Europa’s surface to be drawn into the moon’s far deeper ocean, said Don Blankenship, a geophysicist and Europa specialist also at the University of Texas.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/theory-of-subsurface-lakes-boost-hopes-for-life-on-jupiters-moon-europa/2011/11/16/gIQADp8hRN_story.html

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What a sad, lonely species we are. All 7,000,000,000 of us.

[kestrel91316]

1. Wow. MORE species of life to exploit into extinction! Yay!

[NickB79]

7. Most likely there are only microbes there

The amount of energy available based upon the geothermal upwellings of the core would prohibit anything much larger than a worm from evolving in such an environment.

Beyond that, how exactly are we going to exploit a planet twice the distance from us as Mars, when we can't even get to Mars as it is?

[AlbertCat]

10. The amount of energy available based upon the geothermal upwellings of the core

...would prohibit anything much larger than a worm from evolving

*******

You don't know that. The worms in geothermal upwellings on Earth are quite big. And Europa is tugged and pulled by Jupiter's mighty gravity so it may well have plenty of geothermal energy to work with.

But getting there, as you point out, is a huge pain and not cost effective for exploitation.

[kestrel91316]

17. I'm sure the greedy will find a way.

[Bucky]

25. Microbes or not, they're foreigners. The CIA must have the latitude to torture them.

Europans hate us for our freedom.

[wordpix]

18. sadly, how true---we can't even take care of life here on earth, much less another planet's moon

[timtom]

29. Reminds me of a Jack Handey quote:

“I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it.”
― Jack Handey, Deepest Thoughts: So Deep They Squeak

[Uncle Joe]

2. Crammed on one tiny ass blue marble floating around in infinite space.

"What a sad, lonely species we are. All 7,000,000,000 of us."

I don't believe we're "sad" so much as a curious and social species looking for answers and company.

Thanks for the thread, No Joe.

[johnd83]

3. Unfortunately the mission that would have found life on Europa was cancelled

It was to be called JIMO (Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter) and would drop landers on all the moons (at least that was the last plan I heard). Included in this mission would have been Cryobot, a nuclear powered drill and submarine to study Europa. Instead we are getting a giant rocket to launch... well, nothing really. We are just getting a giant rocket instead of actual science missions.

http://www-robotics.jpl.nasa.gov/applications/applicationArea.cfm?App=6

[kenfrequed]

8. Well

I imagine the religious right are glad Nasa was defunded and missions like this were cut.

[johnd83]

9. Actually NASA isn't that poorly funded

They got a little over $17 billion this year. We just put the money toward outdated rocket technology instead of new technology for planetary missions and robotic missions. There is no point in building huge rockets until we have something to launch!

EDIT: And they just took money away from funding things like SpaceX that actually have a good rocket design that has been tested and works. :banghead:

[kenfrequed]

11. uhm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA#Annual_budget.2C_1958-2011

If you look at it in terms of the budgent from 2000 on things seem kind of troublesome. I would argue against the idea that they haven't been suffering from budget cuts. Particularly during the time that that program was slashed.

As to Space X, it is a private industry and NASA gets to choose who it contracts based on their priorities. Nasa did not "take money" from Space X as it is not their money.

[johnd83]

13. I see your point about the budget, but you inverted my SpaceX point

There is a budget item in NASA to help fund development of the SpaceX rocket. That budget was reduced to pay for the new mega-rocket. The mega-rocket will be built by a private company as well, but it will be a member of the MIC instead of a startup, and we will provide a firehose of money for outdated technology.

[Gore1FL]

16. Considering their missions

They are vastly under funded.

Less than 1/2 penny on the dollar goes to NASA.

I'll let Neil Degrasse Tyson make my argument for me:

First of all, let's clarify what the NASA budget is. Do you realize that the $850 billion dollar bailout, that sum of money is greater than the entire 50-year running budget of NASA?

And so when someone says, "We don't have enough money for this space probe," I'm asking, no, it's not that you don't have enough money, it's that the distribution of money that you're spending is warped in some way that you are removing the only thing that gives people something to dream about tomorrow.

You remember the 60s and 70s. You didn't have to go more than a week before there's an article in Life magazine, "The Home of Tomorrow," "The City of Tomorrow," "Transportation of Tomorrow". All of that ended in the 1970s. After we stopped going to the Moon, it all ended. We stopped dreaming.

And so I worry that the decision that Congress makes doesn't factor in the consequences of those decisions on tomorrow. Tomorrow's gone. They're playing for the quarterly report, they're playing for the next election cycle, and that is mortgaging the actual future of this nation, and the rest of the world is going to pass us by.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3_F3pw5F_Pc

Edited to Add:

http://bigthink.com/ideas/13152 because it is more Neil Degrasse Tyson arguing for NASA.

[johnd83]

26. Personally I would love to see nasa have $50-100 billion to do manned missions

however I am not optimistic about getting it from congress. There is enough money to do really good unmanned missions, but not enough to do much manned. Right now we are getting very little of both.

[No Joe]

27. Let's start screaming, "EUROPA HAS WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION!!!!!"

And it's our duty as Americans to free the subsurface life forms from their icy tyranny! (Hey, if we don't deal with the Europan ice NOW, our grandchildren will be fighting that Godless ice in our streets!)

[Gore1FL]

30. Absolutely.

Beat them there so they don't come here.

[sofa king]

32. NASA's budget usually compares well with programs for American Indians.

And American Indians, of course, are the most impoverished and neglected Americans there are. $18 Billion is less than the Department of Defense blows every ten days.

(The figure of $18-20 billion was about what tribes got through the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Indian Health Service, and hundreds of smaller offices and programs, just as NASA's budget is distributed across an ever-declining array of competing programs.)

[guitar man]

4. Attempt no landings there

:silly:

[Kingofalldems]

5. Art Bell was talking about this many years ago.

[AlbertCat]

12. Art Bell was talking about this many years ago.

And Arthur C Clarke was writing books about it decades ago.

[and-justice-for-all]

6. If we ever get our shit together, we should go and look..nt

[greiner3]

14. Wasn't this the basis for Arthur C. Clarke's;

Second in the four part series that began with '2001: A Space Odyssey?'

'2010: Odyssey Two' deals with the superior intelligence that made the black monoliths. As Heywood Floyd approaches Jupiter in a joint US/Russian craft, the monolith that had orbited Jupiter descends to the planet where it begins multiplying. Soon the entire planet's surface becomes black. The entity that was Bowman tells the crew of the spacecraft that they must leave Jupiter because it will blow up. They do and the force of the explosion turns Jupiter, which many believe is a failed sun after all, into the solar system's second sun. All the moons that were orbiting Jupiter become, in essence, planets that revolve around Jupiter. Jupiter's warmth turns Europa's frozen oceans into liquid. The final message from HAL, 'who' had been brought to working order;

"ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE." This refers to the planets of Jupiter.

This is why I love Sci-Fi. Science that CAN and usually happen. I do not care for 'Fantasy.' Magic may be something that is science to a primitive culture but waving a birch twig around has no draw for me.

[Occulus]

33. To pick a nit,

the monoliths didn't exactly make Jupiter explode. They increased the mass of the planet just enough to allow a self-sustained fusion reaction. In essence, the monoliths acted like a kickstarter.

Now, suppose that actually did occur? What would happen to the orbits of the new planets surrounding the new binary companion to our primary? It seems to me the orbits of Europa, Io and the rest would be somewhat... perturbed by that.

I have a program for my PC called "Universe Sandbox". I think it can model exactly this situation. Hmm... I might have to try this out!

[defendandprotect]

15. Doubt that we are alone in the universe, however, if anyone is thinking of jumping from

one destroyed planet to another, they should know that we are essentially earth

bound due to the radiation in universe. That is, unless we find instant/time travel!

[Confusious]

19. Yes of course, we never landed on the moon

and not like there's a space station in orbit around the earth

:eyes:

and it's also not like the magnetic field which protects us from the sun probably has less power then a 60 watt light bulb.

:eyes:

[Taverner]

20. I was wondering where I was going to go on vacation...

Now I know!

[N7Shepard]

21. Why are we screwing around on Mars and not exploring Europa? I know

it's about 2-3x longer distance, but still...

[N7Shepard]

22. Oops, meant 10x

[Humanist_Activist]

28. Little bit more than just distance...

Mars has potential for life as well, especially in subsurface aquifers, in addition, that water is much more accessible for testing, some of it being so close to the surface it actually sometimes(seasonally apparently) bursts onto the surface and then is subsumed. The water on Europa is locked in an ice sheet that could be many kilometers thick and hence much harder to get to.

[fl_socialist]

23. Very interesting, thanks for sharing.

Wow. Very interesting, thanks for sharing.

If live does "evolve" on Europa, would that be another nail in the coffin for the creationists?

I'd love to see how people try to spin this one.

[burrowowl]

24. Coooool!

[BamaFanLee]

31. If Europa can support life...

If Europa can support life, can we send the conservatives there? Earth would be much better off without them.