Liquid water, possible life on moon of Saturn

[Photon1001]

The Salty Waters of Saturn's Moon Hint at Life

If water is the elixir of life, it's no wonder that Earth — which is 70% ocean — simply teems with living things. The other planets and moons in the solar system don't have it so good. They're forbidding places that are hydrological deserts, and thus biological ones too.

That, at least, had long been the conventional wisdom, but in recent years, scientists have come to learn that by some measures, the solar system fairly sloshes with water. Mars, we now know, was once as wet as Earth and still harbors ice and perhaps liquid water. The moon is thought to have water locked in permafrost at its poles. Jupiter's moon Europa is probably home to a globe-girdling ocean beneath a thin rind of ice, and its Jovian sisters Callisto and Ganymede appear to be icy and wet too. Now, according to new findings by the Cassini spacecraft, one more name can be added to the list of water worlds: Enceladus, a small moon orbiting Saturn. What's more, Enceladus' water might be unusually hospitable to the emergence of life. (See the 50 highs and lows of space exploration.)

The Cassini probe, which was launched from Earth in 1997 and arrived at Saturn in 2004, had a big job to do: principally, studying the planet's elaborate ring system and taking a census of its litter of moons — of which 53 have been found and named. Of those, Enceladus, discovered in 1789, held some of the deepest secrets. (See pictures of Saturn.)

Even viewed from Earth, the 310-mile-diameter moon appears bright white, almost as if covered in ice or snow; when the Voyager 1 spacecraft arrived at Saturn in 1981, it confirmed that long-distance impression. More intriguing was the way Enceladus behaved. Embedded inside Saturn's E ring — the outermost of the eight bands that make up the ring system — Enceladus seemed to orbit with a thick clump of ring matter trailing behind it, almost as if it were dragging the material in its gravitational wake. What astronomers suspected instead — and what Voyager confirmed — was that Enceladus was not dragging matter but expelling it, chugging through its orbits like a locomotive and leaving a vapor trail behind it. What astronomers couldn't know for sure was what the exhaust was made of. (Watch a video of the first broadcast from the moon.)

"Potential plume sources on Enceladus are an active area of research," says Linda Spilker, a Cassini project scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

In 2005, Cassini helped advance that research when it endeavored to determine the composition of the exhaust in the most straightforward way possible: by flying through it and registering the thousands of high-speed pellets that collided with its skin. The speed and density of the pellets confirmed that they were ice. Analyzing the precise composition of that ice has taken years, but the results, published this week in the journal Nature, were worth the wait.

Not only is the ice made of ordinary water, but it's salt water, with sodium turning up in the samples no matter how many times the ring material was retested. "Our measurements imply that besides table salt, the grains also contain carbonates like soda," says Frank Postberg, a Cassini scientist working at the Max Planck Institute in Heidelberg, Germany. (See a photo-essay of the world's most competitive space programs.)

For biologists, that's huge. The only way to account for that particular chemistry is if the salts have dissolved out of rocks in the interior of Enceladus into a large quantity of standing water, as would occur if the moon had a subsurface ocean. "Both components [table salt and carbonates] are in concentrations that match the predicted composition of an Enceladus ocean," says Postberg. "The carbonates also provide a slightly alkaline pH value, which could provide a suitable environment on Enceladus for life precursors."

How a moon that hangs in the frigid depths of the solar system could keep water in a liquid state is not much of a mystery. Too small to have a molten core and too far from the sun to feel even a flicker of its heat, Enceladus does have other moons — principally outlying Tethys and Dione — orbiting nearby. Each time those moons pass, they give Enceladus a gravitational tug, which causes it to flex slightly. Do that enough times — and the 4 billion years the solar system has been around is more than enough — and the pulsing moon heats up in much the way a wire hanger does if you bend it repeatedly back and forth. That explains both why the water stays liquid and why it's repeatedly squeezed up through cracks and into space, where it flash-freezes into icy mist.

The book on Enceladus is by no means closed, and Cassini has two more flybys of the moon scheduled for November. Scientists aren't expecting to find proof of biology there anytime soon — but now, at least, they've got a good reason to look.

The Salty Waters of Saturn's Moon Hint at Life - TIME

So add Enceladus to Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede, as possible places we might once find life under an icy exterior. If so, then the possibilities of life on extra-solar planets must also be greater as well, I'd imagine as well.

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by Photon1001

The Salty Waters of Saturn's Moon Hint at Life - TIME

So add Enceladus to Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede, as possible places we might once find life under an icy exterior. If so, then the possibilities of life on extra-solar planets must also be greater as well, I'd imagine as well.

Something is wrong with your understanding of probability if you conclude this.

In any event, this is an awesome find.

[Photon1001]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

Something is wrong with your understanding of probability if you conclude this.

In any event, this is an awesome find.

yes I know life on other planets totally freaks you out. its okay though, lots of ppl get that feeling...

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by Photon1001

yes I know life on other planets totally freaks you out. its okay though, lots of ppl get that feeling...

Once more demonstrating your inability to comprehend sentences more complex than those you'd find in a Harry Potter novel.

[Photon1001]

[ChadLS]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

Something is wrong with your understanding of probability if you conclude this.

In any event, this is an awesome find.

Well technically if the universe is of near-infinite size then probability states that life has to exist somewhere else other than Earth.

We've only been space-faring for half a century and we've already discovered several of Earth-like planets that could support life just in our arm of the galaxy.

So if you take the billions of galaxies in the universe, it's gotta (or already has) happen somewhere else.

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by ChadLS

Well technically if the universe is of near-infinite size then probability states that life has to exist somewhere else other than Earth.

We've only been space-faring for half a century and we've already discovered several of Earth-like planets that could support life just in our arm of the galaxy.

Sorry, the exoplanets we've discovered are Jupiter-esque in size.

Originally Posted by ChadLS

So if you take the billions of galaxies in the universe, it's gotta (or already has) happen somewhere else.

Probability != statistics.

[Meshell]

Our knowledge and technology is getting better making it easier to spot smaller planets. The jury is still out but we may have discovered 45 planets significantly smaller than Jupiter. The universe is too huge to dismiss other possibilities.

Though it's not likely we will ever step foot on another life supporting planet. Our present understanding of physics suggests that long distance manned space flight is problematic or limited to frozen sleeping astronauts. Sent off on trips so long that they will become forgotten memories before they reach their destination. Not sure there is much value to that.

However communicating with planets light-years away- assuming they are fairly advanced- is likely possible. Radio waves are seemingly immune to laws of physics.

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by Meshell

Radio waves are seemingly immune to laws of physics.

Nothing but the hypothetical singularity is immune to the laws of physics.

[Meshell]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

Nothing but the hypothetical singularity is immune to the laws of physics.

I'm not entirely sure I follow what you are suggesting.

Scientist John Singleton insists that Albert Einstein wouldn't be mad at him, even though at first blush Singleton appears to have twisted the famous physicist's theories about light into a pretzel.

Most people think Einstein said that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, but that's not really the case, Singleton said.

Einstein predicted that particles and information can't travel faster than the speed of light — but phenomenon like radio waves? That's a different story, said Singleton, a Los Alamos National Laboratory Fellow.

Singleton has created a gadget that abuses radio waves so severely that they finally give in and travel faster than light.

scientist makes radio waves
travel faster than light

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by Meshell

I'm not entirely sure I follow what you are suggesting.
scientist makes radio waves
travel faster than light

I'm not really suggesting anything, but directly stating that no object in the universe can break the laws of physics.

Unless QFT has completely changed,

we want to point out that no superluminal transmission of signals can be obtained as a consequence of the standard quantum theory of measurement.

And from everything I've ever understood about Quasars and the apparent superluminal emissions:

The explanation can be given in a fairly straightforward way as a light travel time effect. Imagine a body of matter starting at the center of a galaxy and moving quickly towards the observer, nearly head-on but not exactly.
When the body is at the center of the galaxy, it emits some light towards the observer. After it has moved, and again emits light towards the observer, this light will have a shorter travel time since the object is now closer to Earth. An observer ignoring the movement towards Earth and only noticing the perpendicular movement will underestimate the true time interval (for their inertial reference frame), and so will overestimate the object's speed; this overestimated speed can be many times the speed of light.

and

Although a few astrophysicists still argue for this view, most believe that apparent velocities greater than the velocity of light are optical illusions and involve no physics incompatible with the theory of special relativity.

[Meshell]

I totally get that an item with mass cannot reach or exceed the speed of the light. I'm not as sure when an object has no mass like light or radio waves. I don't doubt

Although a few astrophysicists still argue for this view, most believe that apparent velocities greater than the velocity of light are optical illusions and involve no physics incompatible with the theory of special relativity.

But it suggests that the science isn't as clear when an item has no mass.

[ChadLS]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

Sorry, the exoplanets we've discovered are Jupiter-esque in size.

They discovered a planet only 20.5 light years away from Earth, orbiting the star Gliese 581, that could support life.

The planet is only 12,000 miles across (compared to our planet's 9,000) and has a very similar climate.

I'll find a website if I can.

Edit*-http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-450467/Found-20-light-years-away-New-Earth.html

[Photon1001]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

Sorry, the exoplanets we've discovered are Jupiter-esque in size.

Probability != statistics.

wow....

[Photon1001]

Originally Posted by ChadLS

Well technically if the universe is of near-infinite size then probability states that life has to exist somewhere else other than Earth.

We've only been space-faring for half a century and we've already discovered several of Earth-like planets that could support life just in our arm of the galaxy.

So if you take the billions of galaxies in the universe, it's gotta (or already has) happen somewhere else.

Yes, and if the universe is infinite in size.. ..well hold up, 'cause I know some would question that possibility. We figure, based upon evidence, that the universe is roughly 13.7B years old. ..now suppose you were sitting on a planet 6.75B light years from Earth, well you would never be able to see what was happening 6.75B light years in the direct opposite direction as where we sit now. Suppose there are whole clusters of clusters of superclusters of galaxies that we very likely could never see.

Now suppose the universe is infinite, or suppose the "multi-verse", as in all the possibilities of multi-dimensional space-time is infinite. Well, if that is the case, then as infinity is infinite, every possibility (and in the multiverse, perhaps even every impossibility), becomes not only possible, but undeniable.

Of course, I'm personally, perfectly happy dealing with the near-infinite of 3-dimensional space...

[HughRuss]

Originally Posted by ChadLS

They discovered a planet only 20.5 light years away from Earth, orbiting the star Gliese 581, that could support life.

The planet is only 12,000 miles across (compared to our planet's 9,000) and has a very similar climate.

I'll find a website if I can.

Edit*-http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-450467/Found-20-light-years-away-New-Earth.html

I stand corrected.

Awesome find.

[ChadLS]

Originally Posted by HughRuss

I stand corrected.

Awesome find.

Thanks.

Now all we need is the technology to colonize planets lol.

[stolz25]

Originally Posted by ChadLS

Well technically if the universe is of near-infinite size then probability states that life has to exist somewhere else other than Earth.

Just out of curiosity, how could anything be of near-infinite size? If it is finite at all then infinity is still infinitely bigger than it, no matter how large it is.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Originally Posted by stolz25

Just out of curiosity, how could anything be of near-infinite size? If it is finite at all then infinity is still infinitely bigger than it, no matter how large it is.

You're right, the universe is neither infinite nor near-infinite. Also the size of the universe doesn't matter at all to the subject at hand. The universe is constantly expanding.

However, if we wish to speculate on the likelihood of life existing elsewhere, it is quite high. There's no reason to believe that out of the ~100 Billion stars in our galaxy and also ~100 Billion galaxies in our observable universe our planet is the only one to evolve life, or even intelligent life. Life could be extremely rare, but "rare" with those kind of numbers still means a lot.

This type of speculation is fun, but ultimately meaningless. If we are to colonize it will be limited to our solar system. With our technology it will take around 40,000 years (for perspective: 40k years ago humans began the Upper Paleolithic period) to just reach Alpha Centauri, and there is probably nothing there of interest anyway. We'll probably be stuck here until our star finishes its life cycle, but most likely we would've gone extinct long before that. I thought I should bring some cheer to this conversation.

[Frank Cox]

Originally Posted by Photon1001

The Salty Waters of Saturn's Moon Hint at Life - TIME

So add Enceladus to Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede, as possible places we might once find life under an icy exterior. If so, then the possibilities of life on extra-solar planets must also be greater as well, I'd imagine as well.

We don't have a clue how life started on earth but we know it must have happened somewhere else? Evolutionists usually get mad and call people names when you bring up the fact they assume that life started by unknown natural causes which defy the laws of physics, chemistry and mathematics but will stand up and proclaim that life is easy, just add water and wait a few billion years. Of my favorite,hydrogen is an orderless colorless gas that left alone turns in to planets , pets and people.

I think you need to deal with the origin of life on earth instead of worrying about Mars Attacking now that Betty Davis is dead.