Forget moonmen and those old “canals” on Mars , if you want to find life in our solar system, your best bet might be to set your sights beyond the asteroid belt to Jupiter’s moon Europa, which appears to be frozen stiff at first glance.
But appearances can be deceiving, and scientists now believe that beneath Europa’s icy shell lies a tidally-heated liquid water ocean that could contain all the building blocks for life. In February, suspicions that the jovian moon is not frozen solid were bolstered by the observation of vapor plumes emanating from its surface in a new analysis of Hubble telescope data.
NASA has requested public funds to begin planning a mission to Europa, and in July it put out a call for proposals for science instruments that could ride along on the long trip, potentially to help search for signs of life there.
“The possibility of life on Europa is a motivating force for scientists and engineers around the world,” said NASA’s John Grunsfeld at the time.
Last week, NASA seemed to turn up the Europa charm offensive a notch, putting out some “re-mastered” images of the icy world and a new video touting its potential as a dark water world hidden beneath a frozen shell.
While there are those who are skeptical about NASA’s enthusiasm for Europa’s biological potential, Kevin Hand, an astrobiologist with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, lays out the preponderance of evidence in the video below. He says there is a “high degree of confidence” that a liquid ocean on Europa exists today and has existed for billions of years.
“For the first time in the history of humanity we have the tools and technology and capability to potentially answer this question (of the existence of life beyond Earth), and we know where to go to find it.” Hand says. “Jupiter’s ocean world, Europa.”
A new "remastered" image of Jupiter's moon Europa has made it look like the beginning of life itself - an embryo
