Using data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, scientists have confirmed a global ocean on one of Saturn’s moons.
In 2005 — using Cassini — scientists detected icy plumes erupting from the moon’s surface. It was postulated that beneath the icy crust existed a body of water, though it wasn’t clearly understood how large it could be.
READ MORE: Could life exist on Saturn’s moon Titan? These scientists are hopeful
Then, in 2014, researchers confirmed that a large body of water existed beneath the ice, though it wasn’t known whether or not it was global.
This new study confirms that the entire planet has a sub-surface ocean.
As Enceladus orbits the massive Saturn, it wobbles slightly. The only way this would be possible, the scientists concluded, would be if its icy crust wasn’t affixed to an interior, but rather floated atop an ocean.
“If the surface and core were rigidly connected, the core would provide so much dead weight the wobble would be far smaller than we observe it to be,” said Matthew Tiscareno, a Cassini participating scientist at the SETI Institute, and a co-author of the paper. “This proves that there must be a global layer of liquid separating the surface from the core,” he said.
The researchers studied seven years worth of data of Enceladus collected from Cassini, which reached orbit around Saturn in 2004.
An ocean of water means that this moon — along with Jupiter’s moon, Europa — is one of the best places we have of finding life.
Even though this finding does not confirm one way or another if life — in the form of small, prebiotic life — is present, on Earth, one of the key ingredients for life is water.
On Oct. 28, Cassini will make its deepest dive through the plume of icy material, passing just 49 km above the surface of the moon.
The findings were reported in this week’s journal Icarus.
Comments