Water from the subsurface ocean of Saturn’s moon Enceladus sprays from huge fissures out into space. NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which captured this image in 2010. (NASA/JPL)
Scientists have found evidence of a key ingredient for life and a powerful source of energy that could fuel it on Saturn’s icy moon Enceladus.
It was already known that the giant plumes of water vapour and ice grains thrown out by Enceladus are rich with organic compounds, some of which are important for life as we know it to exist. But now, researchers have taken it another step further. They analysed data from NASA’s Cassini mission and found confirmation that hydrogen cyanide, a key life molecule, exists on the icy moon.
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They also confirmed that the ocean that hides under the moon’s icy outer shell holds a powerful source of chemical energy. The study published in the journal Nature Astronomy reveal that there may be more chemical energy inside the moon than previously understood. The higher the energy available, the higher the chances of life existing.
“Our work provides further evidence that Enceladus is host to some of the most important molecules for both creating the building blocks of life and for sustaining that life through metabolic reactions. Not only does Enceladus seem to meet the basic requirements for habitability, we now have an idea about how complex biomolecules could form there, and what sort of chemical pathways might be involved,” said lead author Jonah Peter in a press statement.
This new research presents evidence for new additional chemical energy sources that are a lot more powerful and diverse than the making of methane. This means there are many chemical pathways that can lead to the formation of life in Enceladus’s subsurface ocean.
Unlike previous research, which, according to NASA, focused on lab experiments and geochemical modelling, the new work depended on detailed statistical analysis. The researchers looked at data collected by Cassini’s ion and neutral mass spectrometer. That instrument studied gas, ions and ice grains around Saturn.
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