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Top 6 Places to Find Alien Life In Solar System
We still don't have hard evidence for any life that's not of this Earth, but across
our solar system there are some tantalizing possibilities for primitive life to find a
haven.
Some moons of Jupiter and Saturn are intriguing, and there's also the chance for some surprises
somewhere on Mars.
In this video, I'm going to show you top six places to find alien life in our solar system.
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Here are my top six candidates for the best spots to search for primitive alien life in
our solar system.
1 - Enceladus
It's just a small moon of Saturn, but contrary to historical assumption it's not simply another
pretty ice-covered rock.
In 2005, NASA's Cassini spacecraft photographed geysers of frozen water spewing from cracks
in Enceladus' southern hemisphere.
The best guess is that reservoirs of liquid water lie beneath the frozen exterior, kept
warm by gravitational interactions between this moon and other members of the Saturnian
system.
The necessities for life are there, and maybe Enceladans are as well.
A major factor favoring this moon is that inhabitants could be easy to find.
As SETI Institute colleague Cynthia Phillips says, “Samples of whatever exists in those
hidden aquifers are being continuously thrown into space, just waiting for us to grab.”
No landers, no robot drills – proof for life on Enceladus may be there for the taking.
2 - Mars
Mars remains perennially popular for those hunting for otherworldly protoplasm.
Particularly intriguing are the dark stripes that appear in the Martian summertime at Horowitz
crater.
These are likely to be salty meltwater only inches beneath Mars' dusty epidermis.
A relatively simple probe could sample this muddy environment.
Mars has a diameter of about 4,212 miles (or 6,779 km).
3 - Titan
Enceladus' hefty sibling is the only world in the solar system (besides Earth of course)
known to sport liquid lakes.
These are lakes of ethane and methane – liquid natural gas – endlessly topped up by a drizzle
of hydrocarbon rain.
But despite the odd ingredients and Titan's gelid temperatures (minus 290 Fahrenheit,
or minus 179 Celsius), this is a world where chemistry's a happening enterprise.
In addition, we know how to get robot landers onto its surface, because we've done it.
In 2005 the Huygens probe set down on Titan's ice-balled landscape.
A future probe – able to sail this moon's pungent lakes – might uncover a cache of
the Titans.
4 - Europa
Many would grant this Jovian moon a higher rating than I have, since there's probably
more liquid water here than in all of Earth's oceans.
The downside is that Europa's vast and salty seas lie beneath roughly 10 miles of ice that's
harder than tensor calculus.
Not only would it be a labor of Hercules to get a probe beneath this icy armor, but Europa's
oceans are darker than a cave – which means photosynthesis won't work.
However, there could be something down there subsisting on geothermal heat or complex molecules
from the surface.
5 - Venus
A surprise entry in the exobiology sweepstakes, our sister planet, with its scorching surface
temperatures (850 Fahrenheit, or 454 Celsius), is generally assumed to be as sterile as a
boiled mule.
But planetary scientist David Grinspoon, astrobiology curator at the Denver Museum of Nature and
Science, points out that high in the Venusian atmosphere temperatures are refreshingly tolerable.
In addition, he notes, there's an interesting bit of chemistry going on here involving sulfur
dioxide and carbon monoxide that might serve as a food chain for floating microbes.
It's conceivable that Venus' opaque and acidic cloud banks are laced with atmospheric aliens.
6 - Callisto and Ganymede
I've binned these two moons of Jupiter together, as I feel they're neck-and-neck candidates
for biology.
Like their more celebrated neighbor Europa, they may have buried, liquid oceans.
However, in the case of these two satellite siblings, briny deeps would underlie at least
60 miles or 100 km of rock.
Finding inhabitants here is a shovel-ready project for our grandkids.
These are my favorite places to look for extraterrestrial biology.
I remind you that my preferences are no more than that of personal taste.
The decision, as always in science, will be made by the data and surely there are more
than just six.
Well, that's the Top 6 Places to Find Alien Life in our solar system.
Really cool information isn't it?
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