Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Evidence for a Deep Ocean on Europa Might be Found on its Surface

Evidence for a Deep Ocean on Europa Might be Found on its Surface:
Astronomers hypothesize that chloride salts bubble up from the icy moon's global liquid ocean and reach the frozen surface where they are bombarded with sulfur from volcanoes on Jupiter's fourth largest moon, Io. This illustration of Europa (foreground), Jupiter (right) and Io (middle) is an artist's concept. Credit: Keck Observatory.
Evidence for a Deep Ocean on Europa Might be Found on its Surface
Astronomers hypothesize that chloride salts bubble up from the icy moon’s global liquid ocean and reach the frozen surface where they are bombarded with sulfur from volcanoes on Jupiter’s fourth largest moon, Io. This illustration of Europa (foreground), Jupiter (right) and Io (middle) is an artist’s concept. Credit: Keck Observatory.
Astronomer Mike Brown and his colleague Kevin Hand might be suffering from “Pump Handle Phobia,” as radio personality Garrison Keillor calls it, where those afflicted just can’t resist putting their tongues on something frozen to see if it will stick. But Brown and Hand are doing it all in the name of science, and they may have found the best evidence yet that Europa has a liquid water ocean beneath its icy surface. Better yet, that vast subsurface ocean may actually shoot up to Europa’s surface, on occasion.

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Read the rest of Evidence for a Deep Ocean on Europa Might be Found on its Surface (811 words)

© nancy for Universe Today, 2013. |
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