Ocean Spray On Saturn Moon Contains Crucial Constituents For Life (theguardian.com) 50
Astronomers have found that blasts of ocean spray erupting from the Saturn moon of Enceladus contain complex organic molecules, "making it the only place beyond Earth known to harbor crucial constituents for life as we know it," reports The Guardian. From the report: Astronomers detected the compounds in plumes of water and ice that shoot from huge fractures in the south pole of Enceladus, a 300-mile-wide ice ball that orbits Saturn along with 52 other moons. Enceladus stands out among the planet's natural satellites because it hosts a global water ocean beneath its frozen crust. German and U.S. scientists found tell-tale signs of organic molecules far more complex than amino acids and 10 times heavier than methane in data gathered by Nasa's Cassini probe as it flew over the fractures on Enceladus. Known as "tiger stripes," the fissures reach several miles down into the ice and are largely filled with ocean water that percolates up from the ocean.
Writing in the journal Nature, Frank Postberg, a planetary scientist who worked on the data at Heidelberg University, and his colleagues describe their analysis of fresh Cassini data that shows that most ice particles blasting out of Enceladus are almost pure water. But a small proportion, about 1%, are rich in organic molecules containing carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and potentially nitrogen too. Some were made up of hundreds of atoms. "Our results mark the first ever detection of complex organics coming from an extraterrestrial water world," said Postberg.
Writing in the journal Nature, Frank Postberg, a planetary scientist who worked on the data at Heidelberg University, and his colleagues describe their analysis of fresh Cassini data that shows that most ice particles blasting out of Enceladus are almost pure water. But a small proportion, about 1%, are rich in organic molecules containing carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and potentially nitrogen too. Some were made up of hundreds of atoms. "Our results mark the first ever detection of complex organics coming from an extraterrestrial water world," said Postberg.
Unfortunately (Score:1)
Amazing (Score:5, Funny)
It's amazing to think that on earth it just contains cranberries.
For life LIKE US. (Score:1)
The universe will surprise us with types of life that we never imagined.
Hell, it does that right here on Earth!
Yet we still act about as wise regarding this as the "scientists" in Idiocracy that studied penis enlargement and hair growth.
I hope we find out what caused the average IQ to fall since the 70s"> before it's too late.
Re: (Score:1)
Poor people have more children. It's a very natural response to extreme environmental pressures. I, however, can think of at least one family who could have had one less child, and not contributed to growing population of heartless stupid assholes.
some quotes (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.nature.com/article... [nature.com]
This makes this sound almost like we can do a long distance crystallography on these.
Luckily in the article itself it explains that what they mean is the presence of peaks characteristic of aromatic rings and
Re:Ocean Spray... (Score:5, Funny)
Now certified Organic.
Re: (Score:2)
If you want to get pedantic, it's "Saturn's moon Enceladus", "Enceladus, one of Saturn's moons", or "Enceladus, a moon of Saturn".
Re: (Score:2)
And here I was busy madly quibbling over the absurdity that a water fountain is considered "ocean spray." I mean, unless the tidal forces bounced it off a rock into the air, it isn't ocean spray.
But I do like cranberries, or really any species of Vaccinium.
Epic Overlord Fail (Score:2, Funny)
ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS – EXCEPT EUROPA.
ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE.
Off-mike: what do you mean, you landed on the wrong moon? How can you land on the wrong moon? ... The wrong moon circling the wrong freaking planet? ... Do you have any idea how dumb this makes us look? ... What am I supposed to tell the Earthlings? ...
CORRECTION. ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS – EXCEPT ENCELADUS.
ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE.
Re:Epic Overlord Fail (Score:5, Interesting)
Solar system with regard to (potentially) habitable environments:
it is speculated that there are proper conditions in the upper atmosphere, which contains water vapor and where temperatures are right, spots of UV absorption are detected, yet not explained
abundance of life, the earliest fossils indicate that life started as soon as there were proper conditions, some even speculate that there might be intelligent life ;-)
had proper conditions in the past, is smaller so it cooled faster (if any life, then likely much sooner then on Earth), had water and denser atmosphere, now there are complex organic molecules (recently detected by Curiosity) and seasonal changes of methane, which is a clue, however can also be explained by some geological processes
organics and "... may have a remnant internal ocean of liquid water under the layer of ice ..." wiki [wikipedia.org]
Europa - vast subsurface H2O ocean with detected plumes, Ganymede - subsurface H2O ocean (additionally own magnetic field), Callisto - small subsurface H2O ocean (likely)
Enceladus - subsurface H2O ocean, detected plumes, very likely conditions similar to Earth ocean vents (which are hypothesized to be the cradle for life), Titan - surface methane lakes with rain and thick atmosphere, hypothesized subsurface H2O ocean with enough organics to "cook" something
hypothesized subsurface H2O ocean
All the above we know, because we send some probes there, we have never sent any probe capable of directly detecting life only organics (except Vikings) and mostly organics were detected (Vikings detected life - however the results were inconclusive, aka there is other explanation for the data). There are still places like Triton, which is geologically active and is expected to be very similar to Pluto.
Vast number of exoplanet in habitable zones, which we now have technology to remotely sense (not money or commitment however).
For comparison:
Re: (Score:2)
I note you left the James Webb telescope off the list. 10 billion in and more delays and money needed....what a goatfuck with drunken goats
Re: (Score:2)
I just provided some perspective.
Indeed JWST is terribly over budget and just a mistake of cleaning thrusters with improper detergent resulted in their damage and $600mln repair costs (close to the whole New Horizons mission). The project is terribly mismanaged, however it does not mean that JWST itself is not worth building. In this case Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems became too comfortable with costs+profits contracting model, which still dominates government projects.
I think this mismanagement shou
Re: (Score:2)
Yes the Webb is indeed worth building since one thing it would do is of particular interest to me, so it is the one program that triggers me the most
Re: (Score:1)
Still open to debate, but their leader does spray organics.
Re: (Score:2)
[...]
Earth:
abundance of life, the earliest fossils indicate that life started as soon as there were proper conditions, some even speculate that there might be intelligent life ;-)
[...]
I've investigated Earth life forms extensively, and found no conclusive evidence for Intelligent Life -- in fact, quite the reverse.
Humans claim to be the most intelligent lifeform, yet they Elected Trump in the USA. Also look at the huge predilection for insisting that things are true, despite obvious conflict with Reality, such as: Flat Earthers, Creationists, and Global Warming Denialists!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Aha! <dl> , <dt> and <dd> ! Neat!
What molecules?? (Score:1)
Ach, it pisses me off, Slashdot has become so non-technical. And media in general, reflecting the lack of science knowledge, but here I expect better than that.
How come the names of actual types of molecules are not named or described. No, I can't afford to scale the pay-wall.
But such summaries are useless.
".... tell-tale signs of organic molecules far more complex than amino acids and 10 times heavier than methane...t a small proportion, about 1%, are rich in organic molecules containing carbon, hydrogen
Re: (Score:2)
Ocean Spray? (Score:3)
Spray particles escaping into solar system (Score:1)
According to wikipedia some particles far exceed escape velocity. If life exists there then it may have been 'exploring' for a long time if only as spores... good sf story here!
"Ocean Spray On Saturn Moon Contains..." (Score:2)
As if Cranberry needed anything to taste any worse.
So what? (Score:2)