CNet:
Europa, the fourth-biggest moon orbiting gas giant Jupiter, hides a salty, liquid ocean underneath its icy shell and thus, may harbor the ingredients necessary for life. A new study has found that Europa's surface is full of sodium chloride -- table salt -- and concludes the hidden ocean underneath Europa's ice may be more similar to Earth's oceans than previously imagined.
The study, published Wednesday in Science Advances by researchers at Caltech and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, show for the first time how yellow patches on Europa's surface, first noticed by NASA proves Voyager and Galileo decades ago, actually indicate the presence of sodium chloride.
Excellent! The astronaut who catches the first Europan fish won't have to send away for seasoning.
Also at Caltech.
Sodium chloride on the surface of Europa (open, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aaw7123) (DX)
Related Stories
Europa volcanism & interior heating modeled in detail, offers research targets for upcoming missions
Europa, an icy Jovian moon that likely possesses an ocean beneath its icy crust, may have an interior that is hot enough to produce volcanic activity on its seafloor. New research provides evidence that this seafloor volcanism likely occurred in the moon's past and [may be] ongoing at present as well.
The team of researchers, led by Dr. Marie Běhounková of Charles University in the Czech Republic, developed their own 3D models of Europa's interior and heating transfer properties to investigate the possibility of volcanism on Europa's ocean floor given other volcanism seen in the Jovian system.
[...] These volcanoes would form due to the melting of Europa's interior and heat transfer from the rocky interior of Europa to the seafloor. Models developed by Běhounková et al. show that many different factors — including radiogenic power and tidal forces — contribute to the melting of the icy moon's interior.
[...] A Laplace resonance is a phenomenon that occurs when three planetary bodies with an orbital period ratio of 1:2:4 exert regular and periodic gravitational effects on each other. These nudges create tidal forces that translate to the heating of the body's interior.
It's that interaction that led Běhounková et al.'s research toward the conclusion that this resonance and the associate tidal forces can cause increased periods of volcanic activity — called magmatic pulses — on Europa.
Journal Reference:
Marie Běhounková, Gabriel Tobie, Gaël Choblet, et al. Tidally Induced Magmatic Pulses on the Oceanic Floor of Jupiter's Moon Europa, Geophysical Research Letters (DOI: 10.1029/2020GL090077)
Previously: Hydrogen Emitted by Enceladus, More Evidence of Plumes at Europa
Plate Tectonics on Europa and Subsurface Oceans in the Outer Solar System
NASA Finds Evidence of Water Plume on Europa
Europa Plume Sites Lack Expected Heat Signatures
Jupiter's Watery Moon, Europa, Is Covered in Table Salt
Jupiter's Ocean Moon Europa Probably Glows in the Dark
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:29PM (7 children)
But is it iodized [wikipedia.org]?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:43PM
Watch out where the huskies go,
and don't you eat that yellow snow
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:50PM (1 child)
2001: A Space Odyssey and wondering if there was galactic irony in there being life actually on Europa :)
(Score: 5, Informative) by stormwyrm on Friday June 14 2019, @03:10AM
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @05:26AM
Quick!
America HAS to assault this moon!
(pun intended)
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Friday June 14 2019, @10:08AM
More importantly: how to remove the micro-plastic? You see, in that cold climate the aliens will use tons of facial creams.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday June 14 2019, @02:47PM (1 child)
I don't think we know... [usra.edu], but another source seems to imply it isn't a surface element. Guess the aliens will have goiters.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday June 14 2019, @02:48PM
Damn, forgot to close the tag on the second reference [virginia.edu] that talks about surface component elements. Oh well.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Bot on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:32PM (1 child)
>The astronaut who catches the first Europan fish won't have to send away for seasoning.
Or, Europish fish will find the astronaut lame and overpackaged.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:47PM
So Long, and Thanks for All the Astronauts.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 13 2019, @10:40PM (1 child)
and Callisto is the pepper, Io the Sriracha sauce, and Ganymede the drink ice.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday June 13 2019, @11:22PM
No need. We'll make sure the first astronaut who lands there is a traditional Irish, a believer that salt is all the spices you need to cook.
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Friday June 14 2019, @01:28AM
does it have added Iodine, a necessary nutrient?
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by black6host on Friday June 14 2019, @02:58AM
Only those whose tongues have been cut out would dare attempt, and fail, to utter those words! :)
(Score: 2) by Username on Friday June 14 2019, @04:25AM (1 child)
If the oceans turns out to be close enough to our salinity, do we not owe it to life to colonize this planet with bacteria and other organisms that live on the bottom of our oceans?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @07:07AM
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Friday June 14 2019, @04:26AM
Yeah, well, I hope Europa has blood pressure meds to go with all that sodium.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..