By Amy Meng Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably know by now that there is water on Mars. You probably also breathed a sigh of disappointment when this water was announced as inhospitably salty, presuming that this news was then crammed into a box somewhere labeled: “NASA’s Anticlimactic Letdowns”. But in space agencies around the world, precisely the opposite happened: champagne bottles popped open as researchers celebrated a monumental triumph for mankind. Though we have yet to find definitive evidence of extraterrestrial life, we now know for certain that Earth is not as rare as we had previously thought in its ability to host life. This opens, quite literally, a whole new universe of riveting possibilities. NASA’s gaze has now shifted to Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons. Initially, Europa seems pretty unfriendly. Its surface is bombarded with dangerous ionizing radiation and encased in a kilometers-thick crust of ice (okay, maybe unfriendly is an understatement). However, researchers using the Hubble Telescope in 2013 have spotted geysers of water blasting out from within its surface. They believe that, aside from tidal action, this water is heated by hydrothermal vents which are also responsible for Earth’s early lifeforms. A source of heat energy, water, and shelter from dangerous radiation—no wonder Europa is NASA’s newest darling. (Jupiter’s moon Enceladus is also quite ravishing, but that’s another story.) In light of these exciting findings, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is assembling a flyby mission to sample Europa’s geysers in the mid-2020s. The spacecraft will orbit Jupiter and conduct 45 flybys of Europa, also investigating the composition of its interior and icy shell. Regardless of what we find, this mission this will bring us ever closer to answering the question: are we alone in the universe?
One enthusiastic proponent of this mission is William Nye, CEO of the Planetary Society (you probably know him as “Bill Nye the Science Guy,” or “the bowtie dude with wicked eyebrows"). The Planetary Society is the world’s largest nonprofit organization supporting space exploration. In an interview by Big Think, Nye addresses qualms about the expense of the mission. He estimates costs to total approximately $2 billion, a price he jokes is “relatively inexpensive.” “But,” he continues, gesturing excitedly in Science Guy-esque fashion, “$2 billion spread over ten years is barely the cup of coffee per taxpayer – once. And my feeling is that people buy more than one cup of coffee every ten years.” Source: [1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/04/bill-nye-europa-jupiter-extraterrestrial-life-video_n_5638320.html [2] http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/europa-mission/ Click to Donate to The Planetary Society!
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorsThe authors of these blog posts are staff writers of The Triple Helix at Georgetown University. Archives
November 2016
|