Ingredients for the discovering life springing from the moon of Saturn

"This is a powerful study with a powerful result," she said.

The results published in the journal Nature are based on data collected by two Cbadini instruments – the Cosmic Dust Analyzer and the Ion and Neutral Mbad Spectrometer – when the spacecraft flew over the outermost ring of Saturn and the plumes of Enceladus (pronounced "en-SELL-a-due").

Previous research has detected small organic molecules such as methane. of four hydrogen atoms attached to a single carbon atom. The spectrometer has also detected molecular hydrogen – a chemical feature of hydrothermal activity that provides a significant fuel to living microbes around seafloor vents.

The molecules reported in the new journal Nature are larger "orders of magnitude" than anything seen before, according to the author Frank Postberg, a global scientist at the University of Heidelberg in Germany. There were stable carbon ring structures known as aromatic as well as chains of carbon atoms bonded to hydrogen, oxygen and perhaps even nitrogen.

Some of the molecules detected were so large that the instruments could not badyze them. This suggests that organic compounds found by Cbadini are only fragments of even larger compounds, Postberg said. There can be huge polymers – highly segmented molecules like those that make up DNA and proteins – that are still waiting to be discovered.

"We astrobiologists are excited about larger molecules and stuff like that." Kate Craft, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory

The Molecules Cbadini Detected can be produced abiotically – without the involvement of life.But they are also the kind of compounds that microbes on Earth like to eat, and they could even be byproducts of microbial metabolism.

"In Others terms, they were doing all these tests and did not see these larger molecules, [Enceladus] would not seem livable, "said Craft." But these discoveries … are reasons to say, "Hey, we need to go back and take a lot more data. ""

Scientists believe that Saturn's gravitational influence squeezes and flexes the porous, rocky material in the heart of Enceladus, generating heat. hauler allows chemical interactions between the salty ocean and the seabed. On Earth, these water-rock interactions fuel chemotropes – organisms that recover energy by breaking down chemicals in their environment – and support vast ecosystems in the deepest, darkest depths of the planet. ocean.

Postberg and colleagues propose The depths of the Enceladus Ocean eventually float to the surface, where they form a thin film just beneath the icy crust of the planet.

The oceans are covered with a similar film, note a millimetric coverage of tiny microbes and organic matter. which serves as an important interface between the sea and the sky. Research shows that this layer helps to drive time; when bubbles burst waves, particles of the film are raised in the air, where they form a core around which water can condense to form clouds and fog.

A similar process to the ocean surface of Enceladus can form ice crystals. with the organic materials at their base, said Postberg. These grains are then sucked upward through cracks in the moon's crust called "tiger strips" and then thrown into the void of space

Enceladus plumes are extremely thin – more like a thin veil that a fire jet. Scientists have asked if a spaceship flying through the spray would be able to collect enough organic matter to draw conclusions about their origin.

This result, says Postberg, shows that Enceladus "is nice to us and delivers his inventory space

Cable is a deputy project scientist for a concept called Enceladus Life Finder, which would use more advanced instruments than those of Cbadini to sample the plume during a series of overflights.The mission was not funded by NASA and the space agency has no plans under development to return to Enceladus

She, Postberg and Craft expressed hope that this latest discovery would spark interest for a new mission on the icy moon

. "Enceladus shouts that it has all the ingredients for life as we know it: water, chemistry, organic matter, "Cable said." We have to go back. "