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from the this-is-about-the-80's-band-right? dept.
A giant asteroid impact in the dwarf planet's past offers new insights into the possibility of an ocean beneath its surface.
Ever since NASA's New Horizons spacecraft flew by Pluto last year, evidence has been mounting that the dwarf planet may have a liquid ocean beneath its icy shell. Now, by modeling the impact dynamics that created a massive crater on Pluto's surface, a team of researchers has made a new estimate of how thick that liquid layer might be.
The study, led by Brown University geologist Brandon Johnson and published in Geophysical Research Letters, finds a high likelihood that there's more than 100 kilometers of liquid water beneath Pluto's surface. The research also offers a clue about the composition of that ocean, suggesting that it likely has a salt content similar to that of the Dead Sea.
Europa, Mars, Enceladus, Titan, and now...Pluto? Scientists who search for extra-terrestrial life focus on the presence of liquid water (or hydrocarbons, in the case of Titan), so the list of potential sites in the solar system is growing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @06:58PM
It would be worth it, for the CEO giving the keynote address to take a sip from water brought back from Pluto.
(Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Monday September 26 2016, @08:51PM
Fools! Seduced by a promiscuous gravity well? Fixated on "liquid" water? Do you not realize that if you start mining water from a dwarf planet like Pluto, it will become less massive? If that happens, its orbit will shift further away from Sol, perhaps causing a perturbation in the orbit of Planet X, or Nibiru, that would send it careening into the central solar system where undoubtedly it would of course collide with Earth. All this, for cheap water? What are you, Ice Pirates? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087451/ [imdb.com]
(Score: 2) by turgid on Tuesday September 27 2016, @07:48AM
In Scotland they have eschewed fracking and are building tidal power schemes. It's a Communist plot to drop the Moon on the Land of the Free.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Wednesday September 28 2016, @06:46AM
Ah, the Scots!
In Scotland they have eschewed fracking and are building tidal power schemes. It's a Communist plot to drop the Moon
So, the Moon causes tides, and thus if we take energy from the tides, we are depleting the Moon? Am I reading this right? So once we harness enough tidal energy, the Moon will have to fall from the sky. Still a little unclear on the targeting procedures, though.
But was not this part of my original objection? Liquid water, on Pluto? HOW? Has got to be tidal interaction with Charon, the ferryman to the afterlife (water, you see?) generating sufficient heat. So if we remove enough water to affect that tidal inter-relation, Charon will fall into Pluto, causing Pluto to leave its orbit, perturbing the orbit of the aforementioned Nemesis Planet of Earth, and we all die. Different mechanism, same result. Why not a nice water-mining trip to Europa this summer?