Icy Moons of Our Solar System That May Have Oceans Now | NASA/JPL

Icy Moons of Our Solar System That May Have Oceans Now | NASA/JPL

Scientists think six icy moons in our solar system may currently host oceans of liquid water beneath their outer surfaces. Arranged around Earth are images from NASA spacecraft of, clockwise from the top, Saturn's moon Enceladus, Jupiter's moons Callisto and Ganymede, Neptune's moon Triton, Saturn's moon Titan, and Jupiter's moon Europa, the target of NASA's Europa Clipper mission. The worlds here are shown to scale.

The images of the Saturnian moons were taken by NASA's Cassini mission. The images of the Jovian moons were taken by NASA's Galileo mission. The image of Triton was taken by NASA's Voyager 2 mission. The image of Earth was stitched together using months of satellite-based observations, mostly using data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Terra satellite.

Beyond Earth, Jupiter’s moon Europa is considered one of the solar system’s most promising potentially habitable environments. After an approximately 1.8-billion-mile journey, Europa Clipper will enter orbit around Jupiter in April 2030, where the spacecraft will conduct a detailed survey of Europa to determine whether the icy world could have conditions suitable for life. 

Europa Clipper is the largest spacecraft NASA has ever developed for a planetary mission. It carries a suite of nine instruments along with a gravity experiment that will investigate an ocean beneath Europa’s surface that scientists believe contains twice as much liquid water as Earth’s oceans.

Europa Clipper's science instruments include cameras, spectrometers, a magnetometer, and an ice-penetrating radar. These instruments will study Europa’s icy shell, the ocean beneath, and the composition of the gases in the moon’s atmosphere and surface geology, and provide insights into the moon’s potential habitability. The spacecraft also will carry a thermal instrument to pinpoint locations of warmer ice and any possible eruptions of water vapor.

Europa Clipper Mission website: https://europa.nasa.gov/

'Dreaming of Europa' Posters and Wallpaper (phone and desktop)

Full-size downloads: https://go.nasa.gov/3ZIDxgu

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute/University of Arizona/DLR

Release Date: Oct. 11, 2024

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