Hot water flows on Enceladus, which could harbor life
The search for life in our solar system has pointed us in many directions like Mars and Europa. Now, a new study in Nature just made another candidate look even more promising: Enceladus, an icy moon of Saturn, likely has an active hydrothermal system.
Enceladus has been a popular target for the existence of life ever since Cassini first saw plumes of water vapor coming from its south pole back in 2005. Until now, however, it was unclear how those plumes were connected to the potential subsurface ocean. The icy surface is estimated to be over 25 miles thick, and there was little evidence of hydrothermal activity.
But a team led by the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics found tiny grains of rock — just…
Source:: The Verge
