Researchers have discovered that deep currents and circulation patterns in the oceans beneath Jupiter's moon Europa may generate heat and energies capable of sustaining biological life.
The search for life in our solar system is a constant endeavor by scientists across the globe. Work on missions aiming to colonize Mars is already in progress and now researchers are looking to inhabit other planets too. In one such previous study, researchers found that Jupiter's moon Europa is one planetary body that may be capable of sustaining life.
A previous magnetometer reading from the Galileo spacecraft detecting signs of a salty, global ocean below the moon's icy shell reinforced this idea. As it is impossible to get direct measurements of the ocean, researchers rely heavily on magnetometer data and observations of the moon's icy surface to account for oceanic conditions below the ice. Researchers found that the moon has chaos terrains, regions of disrupted ice on the surface.
According to a new study's lead author Krista Soderlund, these chaos terrains, which are concentrated in Europa's equatorial region, could result from convection in Europa's ice shell, accelerated by heat from the ocean. The heat transfer and possible marine ice formation may be helping form diapirs, or warm compositionally buoyant plumes of ice that rise through the shell, according to a press release.
On analyzing a numerical model of Europa's ocean circulation, researchers found that these warm rising ocean currents may be responsible for the location of chaos terrains and other features of Europa's surface.
The current patterns observed in Europa are quite different from those observed on Jupiter and Saturn. Here bands of storm form as a result of their atmospheric rotations.
"This tells us foundational aspects of ocean physics," noted co-author Britney Schmidt, assistant professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Additionally, if the study's hypothesis is correct, it shows that Europa's oceans are very important as a controlling influence on the surface ice shell, offering proof of the concept that ice-ocean interactions are important to Europa.
"That means more evidence that the ocean is there, that it's active, and there are interesting interactions between the ocean and ice shell," said Schmidt, "all of which makes us think about the possibility of life on Europa."
Future missions to the Jovian system, including the European Space Association's Jupiter Icy moons Explorer or JUICE mission, will provide the research team with more information to include in subsequent models of the icy world.
