Europa!

Dr. Nürburg · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 12:51 am Post subject: Europa!

Seems to me that Europa is so far our best bet for finding extraterrestrial life in our own solar system...

Water On Europa... but Life?
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NickP16AUS · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 1:28 am Post subject:

Have you got a link to the documentary you watched? Is that your website?

Dr. Nürburg · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 1:39 am Post subject:

Yes...

Wonders Of The Solar System

That's my website's forum/blog.
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rogbow · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 11:55 pm Post subject:

I'm curious as to what kind of sea life there may be if this is any. Allthough I doubt anyone in the near future will explore that water on Europa. It would be very interesting if they did explore it.

Dr. Nürburg · Posted: Sun Nov 20, 2011 2:17 am Post subject:

Well basically there is definitely a sea. If you put water on a rugged random rock in space, the ice crust would be rugged and mountainous. Europa is as smooth as a marble. Thus, a ball of water with a smooth warm (possibly molten) core covered in a sheet of ice.

However it is also made up of glaciers that move about and refreeze. Studying the way they move about, scientists can confirm that they must be moving over a massive ocean.

Most interestingly, there are coloured markings all over Europa's surface which suggest organic processes are taking place.

Life can survive and even flourish in ice and so most certainly in an ocean of water beneath.
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rogbow · Posted: Sun Nov 20, 2011 3:18 am Post subject:

Yes with that sea underneath that layer of ice there could be plenty of sea life there for sure. That's pretty neat how the glaziers move about and refreeze and I'd have to agree there has to be a rather large body of water underneath the ice for that to happen.

Fascinating stuff Knight !! I give you a +1 rep.

Dr. Nürburg · Posted: Tue Jul 30, 2013 1:58 am Post subject:

Well in 2016 Juno will arrive at Europa and we will receive some very detailed information about its chemistry.

Europa's ocean is massive, dwarfing all of Earth's oceans combined.

According to latest surface-ocean interaction data analysed, the ocean of Europa is most probably not only salty but harbours other ingredients which would help sustain life.

Some more bumf...

http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=26749

http://www.space.com/20785-jupiter-moon-europa-interior.html

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2013/06/the-ocean-moon-future-submersible-missions-to-explore-jupiters-europa.html

In any case current developments in robotics specifically designed for a mission to Europa mean that we can expect by 2020 that we will have landed and drilled beneath to film what's there.

Cool

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rogbow · Posted: Sun Aug 04, 2013 5:24 am Post subject:

some more interesting stuff there Dr.N Cool

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Dr. Nürburg · Posted: Sun Aug 04, 2013 5:36 am Post subject:

Heh, it's great #isn't #it... I'm confident we will discover extraterrestrial life of some kind soon... if not in the next 12 years - at least before I die.

There's just so much promising data.

Smile

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