Jupiter’s Moon Europa & The Search For New Life
Jupiter’s Moon Europa & The Search For New Life
Tempreture
With average temperature of minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit, an almost nonexistent atmosphere and a complex web of cracks in layer of Ice encompassing the entire surface, the environment on Jupiter’s moon Europa is about as alien as they come.
How thick is the crust and how deep is the ocean?
Under the ice on jupiters moon Europa there is a huge ocean which may contain life in it.
The ocean is 9 times deeper then the deepest ocean trench and gravitational affects from a planet 318 times the mass of Earth.
Estimating based on the size of the smallest plates (approximately 10 km in diameter), the frozen surface crust may be only a few kilometers thick. Europa has a bulk density of about 3.0 grams per cubic centimeter, 3 times the density of water, so it is believed to be primarily composed of silicates. However, this density still allows for an outer shell of water and/or ice up to 100 km thick surrounding the rocky interior.
How do we know Europa’s surface is made of ice?
The Voyager and Galileo spacecraft were not equipped with instruments which could directly detect water or water ice. Observations of Europa show the geometric albedo is generally high, indicative of a reflective surface. Earth-based observations of the infrared spectra of Europa and the other Galilean satellites were made in the early 1970’s from ground and airborne observatories (4,5). The observations used Michelson interferometer spectrometers and showed that Europa strongly absorbs infrared light with wavelengths of 1.4 and 1.8 microns. This is a distinctive characteristic of water ice, and the strength of the absorption in these bands coupled with the otherwise high albedo is indicative of comparatively uncontaminated ice.
Facts
-Europa has the potential for something very similar to hydrothermal systems we have here in our oceans.
-The globe-spanning ocean on Jupiter’s moon Europa contains about twice the liquid water of all Earth’s oceans combined.
-Jupiter Moon’s Ocean Could Be Rich in Oxygen.
-Europa orbits Jupiter every 3.5 days and is phase locked — just like Earth’s moon.
-As the moon orbits Jupiter, it gets closer and further from the giant planet, changing the amount of gravitational pull it experiences.
-Discovered by Galileo Galilei.
-Europa’s unlit interior is now considered to be the most likely location for extant extraterrestrial life in the Solar System.
-Recent photos from the Cassini spacecraft passing by Enceladus revealed stunning plumes of water-ice jetting out into space.
-The chances for life there have been uncertain, because Europa’s ocean lies beneath several miles of ice, which separates it from the production of oxygen at the surface by energetic charged particles.
-3,100 kilometres (1,900 mi) in diameter.
-Most striking surface features are a series of dark streaks crisscrossing the entire globe.
-In September, 2009, planetary scientist Richard Greenberg calculated that cosmic rays impacting on Europa’s surface convert the ice into oxidizers, which could then be absorbed into the ocean below as water wells up to fill cracks. Via this process, Greenberg estimates that Europa’s ocean could eventually achieve an oxygen concentration greater than that of Earth’s oceans within just a few million years. This would enable Europa to support not merely anaerobic microbial life but potentially larger, aerobic organisms such as fish.