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Saturn Moon Enceladus Is First Alien 'Water World' with Complex Organics
Space.com ^ | 06/27/18 | Charles Q. Choi

Posted on 06/30/2018 4:43:05 PM PDT by Simon Green

Complex organic molecules have been discovered for the first time coming from the depths of Saturn's moon Enceladus, a new study reported.

Spacecraft scheduled to launch soon could explore what this new discovery says about the chances of life within icy moons like Enceladus, the study's researchers said.

The sixth largest of Saturn's moons, Enceladus is only about 314 miles (505 kilometers) in diameter. This makes the moon small enough to fit inside the borders of Arizona.

In 2005, NASA's Cassini spacecraft detected plumes of water vapor and icy particles erupting from Enceladus, revealing the existence of a giant ocean hidden under the moon's frozen shell. Because there is life virtually wherever there is water on Earth, these findings suggested that life might also exist on Enceladus.

Previously, scientists had detected only simple organic (carbon-based) compounds, each less than about five carbon atoms in size, in the plumes of Enceladus. Now, researchers have detected complex organic molecules from the moon, including some at least 15 carbon atoms in size.

"This is the first-ever detection of complex organics coming from an extraterrestrial water world," study lead author Frank Postberg, a planetary scientist at the University of Heidelberg in Germany, told Space.com.

The scientists analyzed data that Cassini gathered when it flew within a plume from Enceladus, as well as from when the probe passed through Saturn's E ring, which is made up of ice grains spewed from Enceladus. The investigators detected ice grains loaded with complex organic material in both the plume and the E ring.

The researchers conjectured that these organic materials were cooked up inside the hot, rocky and fragmented core of Enceladus, which prior work suggested had water seeping through its pores.

"The organics are then injected, together with the hot water, into the overlying cooler ocean by hydrothermal vents," Postberg said. "Then, they can be transported upwards to the ocean surface on the walls of rising bubbles of gas."

Postberg noted that most of the organic-loaded ice grains the researchers saw were in Saturn's E ring. This might suggest that these complex organic molecules were not produced within Enceladus, but instead resulted from sunlight-triggered chemical reactions in space.

"However, we observe the highest proportion of these complex organics in the young, inner E ring close to Enceladus, as compared to the old, outer E ring far away from Enceladus," Postberg said. "Furthermore, we also see the complex organics directly in the plume."

The researchers cautioned that these new findings are not solid evidence for life, as biological reactions are not the only potential sources of complex organic molecules. The next logical step is to go back to Enceladus soon "and see if there is extraterrestrial life," Postberg said. "Nowhere else can a potentially habitable extraterrestrial ocean habitat be so easily probed by a space mission as in the case of Enceladus."

Postberg added that NASA and the European Space Agency already have missions, Europa Clipper and JUICE, respectively, scheduled to launch in 2022 that will visit Europa and Ganymede, the icy moons of Jupiter that have subsurface oceans. These missions will check for habitability on those worlds.

The scientists detailed their findings online June 27 in the journal Nature.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Science
KEYWORDS: catastrophism; enceladus; godsgravesglyphs; saturn; searchforlife
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1 posted on 06/30/2018 4:43:05 PM PDT by Simon Green
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To: SunkenCiv

Ice Pirates ping


2 posted on 06/30/2018 4:45:24 PM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either satire or opinion. Or both.)
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To: Simon Green

“This makes the moon small enough to fit inside the borders of Arizona.”

Perfect size for a detention center.


3 posted on 06/30/2018 4:51:44 PM PDT by Ken H (Best election ever!)
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To: Ken H

Pop went out my nose a little when I read that.


4 posted on 06/30/2018 5:08:28 PM PDT by Trevieze (Messy desk is a sign of a messy mind. An empty desk is a sign of an empty mind!)
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To: BenLurkin
ice_piratwes
5 posted on 06/30/2018 5:10:03 PM PDT by SkyDancer ( ~ Just Consider Me A Random Fact Generator ~ Eat Sleep Fly Repeat ~)
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To: Ken H
Perfect size for a detention center.

Actually we'd appreciate all that ice ice. It's 104 at the moment.

Another report of "complex organics" but nothing about what species the molecules were or what instruments were used to detect them. Sounds like simple polymers but no details.

6 posted on 06/30/2018 5:12:10 PM PDT by InABunkerUnderSF (Time to BLOAT again.)
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To: Simon Green
Complex organic molecules have been discovered for the first time coming from the depths of Saturn's moon Enceladus, a new study reported.

I didn't know we landed on Enceladus and did tests of ice samples.

Is there video?

Are the results of the tests published?

7 posted on 06/30/2018 5:16:22 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
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To: Simon Green

Previously, scientists had detected only simple organic (carbon-based) compounds, each less than about five carbon atoms in size, in the plumes of Enceladus. Now, researchers have detected complex organic molecules from the moon, including some at least 15 carbon atoms in size.

Pretty amazing that we can detect something 5 carbon atoms
in size, around another planet.


8 posted on 06/30/2018 5:19:41 PM PDT by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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To: yesthatjallen
"The scientists analyzed data that Cassini gathered when it flew within a plume from Enceladus"

Enceladus has geysers. Liquid water plumes shooting into space.
9 posted on 06/30/2018 5:23:26 PM PDT by Telepathic Intruder
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To: yesthatjallen

good point. they are just making this up!


10 posted on 06/30/2018 5:40:27 PM PDT by MNDude (WWG1WGA)
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To: Simon Green
The referenced Nature article states:
Two mass spectrometers onboard the Cassini spacecraft, the Cosmic Dust Analyzer (CDA) and the Ion and Neutral Mass psecrometer (INMS), performed compositional in situ measurements of material emerging from the subsurface of Enceladus. These measurements were made inside both the plume and Saturn's E ring, which is formed by ice grains escaping Enceladus' gravity [1.1% of Earth's gravity]....

The mass intervals between the peaks suggest organic species with an increasing number of carbon atoms (C7 to C15), which we refer to as high-mass organic cations (HMOCs). While an interval of 14 u [unified atomic mass unit] would indicate the addition of a saturated CH2 group to an organic 'backbone,' the actual mass difference of 12.5 u indicates the presence of predominately unsaturated carbon atoms.
Basically the spacecraft detected carbon-containing space dust with maybe a little hydrogen in it. Technically interesting, but far from meaning anything like alien space poop.
11 posted on 06/30/2018 5:44:00 PM PDT by Carl Vehse
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To: Telepathic Intruder
There are geysers shooting plumes of liquid water.

And from this, without testing samples, we know for a fact there are complex organics.

Is that right?

12 posted on 06/30/2018 5:57:31 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
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To: yesthatjallen

I don’t know how they determined the carbon molecules in the water in the Saturn moon geysers, but I guess it was done by absorption spectroscopy of some sort. The spectrum of light that has passed through a gaseous or liquid media will be somewhat blocked (absorbed) at specific frequencies by different molecules present in the media.


13 posted on 06/30/2018 6:01:36 PM PDT by Hiddigeigei ("Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish," said Dionysus - Euripides)
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To: Simon Green

“...icy moons like Enceladus” right now a big ice cube on us here in Phx sounds wonderful.

Bring it on!


14 posted on 06/30/2018 6:05:30 PM PDT by Beowulf9
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To: Simon Green

Must be time for the NASA budget.

I feel safe since Trump is trying to create a Space Force.


15 posted on 06/30/2018 6:12:53 PM PDT by arrogantsob (See "Chaos and Mayhem" at Amazon.com)
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To: MNDude

i posted a month ago that much of the photos coming out of NASA are fake. This is such a far stretch and probably wishful thinking, but nothing is proven at all.


16 posted on 06/30/2018 7:35:27 PM PDT by George from New England (escaped CT in 2006, now living north of Tampa)
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To: Simon Green

Funny they would compare Enceladus, a moon with an ocean, to Arizona, a state which notoriously has no ocean-front property. (George Strait was lying.)


17 posted on 06/30/2018 7:57:20 PM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: InABunkerUnderSF

What’s the humidity?


18 posted on 06/30/2018 8:00:13 PM PDT by jmacusa ("Made it Ma, top of the world!'')
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To: Simon Green

Just one question.

How does the big ocean full of water on this small moon replenish itself?

CA....


19 posted on 06/30/2018 8:04:39 PM PDT by Chances Are (Seems I've found that silly grin again....)
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To: Simon Green
Interesting info., but the writer (and editor) need a swift kick. How can a "moon small enough to fit inside the borders of Arizona" have a "giant ocean hidden under the moon's frozen shell"?

For point of reference, the Pacific Ocean is (depending on the data source) about 714 million cubic kilometers (171 million cubic miles) of water, and Enceladus has about 10 million cubic kilometers of water...

Also of interest is that Earth is actually rather dry, taken in total:

http://www.businessinsider.com/water-space-volume-planets-moons-2016-10

20 posted on 06/30/2018 8:07:43 PM PDT by Paul R.
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