The Surprising Number Of Places With Liquid Water In Our Solar System

Most astrobiologists will agree that one of the key ingredients for life is liquid water.

That's why, whenever planetary scientists discover evidence of liquid water on other celestial bodies in space, like Jupiter's moon Europa or Saturn's moon Enceladus, it's an exciting time to speculate whether these watery worlds could harbor alien life.

Right now, Enceladus seems like the most likely place for alien life in our solar system because of evidence pointing to active vents heating the waters along the ocean floor.

But there's a surprising number of other moons and dwarf planets that, scientists suspect, contain vast, deep oceans beneath an icy outer shell. Since we can't actually see underneath the surface, scientists usually detect evidence for the presence of liquid water by using satellites that take pictures during flybys. If there's liquid water underneath, it tends to escape through cracks in the surface and create distinctive plumes, which spacecraft then study for evidence of water vapor or molecules.

Here's a graphic showing the 12 possible places in the solar system where scientists suspect an underground ocean of liquid water:

Most of these objects are moons, like Titan and Callisto, or dwarf planets, like Eris and Pluto, all of which are much smaller than Earth. They are almost all completely unexplored except by brief satellite flybys. The one exception is Saturn's largest moon, Titan.

In 2005, a space probe named Huygens landed on Titan, becoming the first spacecraft to successfully touch down on any celestial body in the outer solar system, beyond Mars. Huygens studied the moon's atmosphere and relayed the data to Earth for about 90 minutes after touchdown.

At nearly 900 million miles from Earth, Huygens is still to this day the most distant successful landing by any man-made spacecraft.

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NOW WATCH: Scientists Have A Pretty Good Idea What Aliens May Actually Look Like

Reference: lights-in-sky.blogspot.com

Nasa Releases New Cassini Spitzer Photos For The Holidays

NASA Releases New Cassini, Spitzer Photos For the Holidays BY SEAN PATTERSON. 10 hours agoJust in time for the holidays, NASA has released two new space photos filled with festive greens and reds.The photo seen above (a larger version of which can be seen here) was taken using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. the infrared image depicts the giant star Zeta Ophiuchi as it hurtles through space, causing a wave in the dust in its path.Astronomers believe Zeta Ophiuchi, which is 20 times more massive than our sun, was once a companion star to an even larger star. When the larger star's life ended, Zeta Ophiuchi was explosively ejected from its system.The above image of Saturn was taken by NASA's Cassini probe. A larger version can be seen by clicking the photo. It shows a backlit view of the planet Saturn and its rings taken during Cassini's 174th orbit of the giant planet. The two small objects in the bottom-left of the photo are Saturn's moons Enceladus and Tethys.Cassini, which has been studying Saturn and its numerous moons since 2004, was intentionally positioned within Saturn's shadow for the pic. It's a perspective Cassini hasn't had since 2006 when it took the "In Saturn's Shadow" photo - one of the most popular Cassini images to date, according to NASA."Of all the many glorious images we have received from Saturn, none are more strikingly unusual than those taken from Saturn's shadow," said Carolyn Porco, Cassini's imaging team lead at the Space Science Institute.The Cassini spacecraft recently celebrated its 15th birthday since its launch back in 1997. In its time in orbit, the probe has launched the Huygens probe to the surface of Titan, where hydrocarbon lakes have also been discovered.(Images courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

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