Detecting life forms on Saturn's moon Enceladus could require 100 flybys through its geyser plume, the study shows.
Detecting life on Saturn's icy moon Enceladus can be done without even landing on the moon, according to new research.
A team of researchers found that it would take more than 100 flybys through a geyser plume on Enceladus with an orbiting
spacecraft to detect signals from a cell phone, an important indicator of the presence of life. This finding should help design future
In 2015, NASA's Cassini spacecraft flew through geysers gushing from the surface of Enceladus. Facts from the severe flybys confirmed
the plume contained abundant dihydrogen (H2), hinting at the presence of hydrothermal vents on the moon's seafloor, which are no longer like those on the planet
The data also reflected generous amounts of carbon dioxide and methane (CH4), each of which told us that the bureaucracy of methane or methanogen-based lifestyle
Now, researchers have modeled the environment of the moon's hydrothermal vent to estimate the mass of this type of methanogenic
Using estimated cell densities, the crew found that the neighborhood or biosphere around the Moon's hydrothermal vents that support life