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It is too early to conclude that life exists on Enceladus, the sixth largest of the 62 confirmed moons of Saturn. But scientists are intrigued because liquid water, a source of energy and organic molecules are three key ingredients to sustain life as we know it – and Encelade has all three of them
" We now know that the Enceladus Ocean has all of these ingredients. Today, "Christopher Glein, a geochemist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas, and a co-author of the study, told MACH in an e-mail. "In addition to the Earth, no other place in the solar system has confirmed the evidence of these three conditions in a contemporary environment that can support life."
Researchers believe that these organic compounds come from the nucleus of Enceladus and spill into the ocean Image: Hydrothermal activity results in the ejection of ice plumes from the oceans on Enceladus />
Previously, scientists had detected methane and methane. Other simple organic compounds in Enceladus plumes.These molecules contain one or two carbon atoms and a few atoms of hydrogen.But the newly detected molecules consist of hundreds of carbon atoms , hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen – all arranged in rings and in long chains
"Large organic molecules are a necessary precursor to life. The data that led to the discovery was obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, which spent 13 years in orbit around Saturn and its moons before NASA handlers completed the mission in September 2017 while driving deliberately. the probe in the rings. planet
To determine if Enceladus hosts life, researchers are now eager to send a space probe to closely explore the icy moon and determine the origins of the molecules.
Encelade is a particularly good target for a space probe. because its ocean "has erupted into the space where it can be sampled simply by flying a spaceship through the plume," said Joseph Spitale, a senior scientist at the Institute of Planetary Science at Tuscon, Arizona,
Spitale stated that the new discovery is not a "smoking gun" for life on Saturn's moon, but with instruments designed to scan biosignatures – or signs of life – the researchers could get a better "We found things," says Glein, "now we have to understand that."
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