Enceladus

Yes, they are.

Saturn's moon Enceladus, you know, the one famous for shooting geysers of water into space, is smaller than that.

But this survey still rules out a huge, vast swath of the major moons in our own solar system.

It is, by a massive margin, the most sensitive exomoon hunt ever conducted, period.

Figure out a way to extract it and possibly load it up as rocket fuel to return.

But when I think of moons like Europa and Enceladus and even other planets like like Mars and Venus and Saturn's moon Titan, which has a thick atmosphere and liquid methane on its surface.

So I think the moon is not really competitive in that realm.

Scientifically, yeah.

Yeah.

When it comes to some of the other moons in our solar system, you pulled on a couple.

You pulled on Enceladus.

I don't know if you mentioned Titan.

Abbiamo persino lune acquatiche nel nostro Sistema Solare che potrebbero ospitare forme di vita aliene.

Si ritiene che le lune di Giove, Ganimede e Callisto o le lune di Saturno, Titano ed Encelado nascondano tutte oceani liquidi sotto le loro croste ghiacciate.

Ora, che si tratti di melma primordiale, di un terrificante mostro marino o solo di un oceano senza fine, TOI-1452 b sarebbe sicuramente un luogo inquietante da visitare.

Ok, andiamo avanti.

I love to hear that.

There's something that you mentioned as well about Enceladus.

Small world surprised everybody because of those plumes and, you know, what is this little world doing having a liquid water ocean? You speculate late in the book that a world like Enceladus with that low gravity is might have these carbonate chimneys, basically the really tall hydrothermal vents that form these big formations at the bottom of our ocean, that they could be on Enceladus kilometers high, which is just amazing.

I mean, that sounds like an image that belongs in one of Jim Cameron's Avatar movies.

For folks out there listening, the way I structured the book, the first half is there's quite a bit of history of science, of space exploration, Earth-ocean exploration, some physics, as Matt referenced with the three easy pieces, etc., But as we move later in the book, I kind of gave myself license to get a little more speculative.

And whether it's in that chapter, just thinking about what hydrothermal vents could potentially look like on Enceladus, how advanced could life get on a world like Europa? You know, that was a lot of fun for me, just being able to get these ideas out onto paper.

Because part of what was great in writing a book, and part of why I like writing popular science, is that some of these ideas are not really fit to print in a book.

scientific journal uh you know i'm not gonna write about an octopus using a hammer in uh uh in which is one of the chapter

I love to hear that.

There's something that you mentioned as well about Enceladus.

Small world surprised everybody because of those plumes and, you know, what is this little world doing having a liquid water ocean? You speculate late in the book that a world like Enceladus with that low gravity is might have these carbonate chimneys, basically the really tall hydrothermal vents that form these big formations at the bottom of our ocean, that they could be on Enceladus kilometers high, which is just amazing.

I mean, that sounds like an image that belongs in one of Jim Cameron's Avatar movies.

For folks out there listening, the way I structured the book, the first half is there's quite a bit of history of science, of space exploration, Earth-ocean exploration, some physics, as Matt referenced with the three easy pieces, etc., But as we move later in the book, I kind of gave myself license to get a little more speculative.

And whether it's in that chapter, just thinking about what hydrothermal vents could potentially look like on Enceladus, how advanced could life get on a world like Europa? You know, that was a lot of fun for me, just being able to get these ideas out onto paper.

Because part of what was great in writing a book, and part of why I like writing popular science, is that some of these ideas are not really fit to print in a book.

scientific journal uh you know i'm not gonna write about an octopus using a hammer in uh uh in which is one of the chapter

They extend beyond Earth.

The conditions in Lake Vostok, sealed water, no sunlight, sustained by geothermal heat, in contact only with rock, are remarkably similar to the conditions believed to exist beneath the ice crusts of Europa and Enceladus, the moons of Jupiter and Saturn that planetary scientists consider the most likely locations for extraterrestrial life in our solar system.

Europa has a global ocean of liquid water beneath a shell of ice, heated from below by tidal forces.

Enceladus has geysers of water erupting from its south pole, suggesting subsurface liquid water in contact with a rocky core.

If life can survive and evolve in Lake Vostok, in the cold, the dark, the pressure, the isolation, then the case for life in the subsurface oceans of the outer solar system becomes significantly stronger.

The parallels are striking.

Europa’s ocean is estimated to be roughly sixty to one hundred fifty kilometers deep, beneath an ice shell that may be ten to thirty kilometers thick.

The ocean is in contact with a rocky seafloor, where tidal heating from Jupiter’s gravitational pull may drive hydrothermal activity similar to the deep-sea vents on Earth.

We even have aquatic moons in our own solar system that could house alien life forms.

It is believed that the moons of Jupiter, Ganymedes and Callisto, or the moons of Saturn, Titan and Enceladus, hide liquid oceans under their frozen crusts.

Now, be it primordial mud, a terrifying sea monster, or just an endless ocean, Toy 1452B would definitely be a disturbing place to visit.

Right, next we are only at number 6 on the list of the most disturbing.