Astronomers have discovered evidence for a large liquid water ocean beneath the surface of Enceladus, Saturn’s unusual, ice-clad moon that’s only one-seventh as large as our Moon. This makes it perhaps an even better candidate for extraterrestrial life than Jupiter’s moon Europa, the other possible candidate in the Solar System.
Observations made by the Cassini probe on a fly-by in 2005 revealed that Enceladus was regularly emitting streams of ice and water from geysers on its surface, which in turn appeared to replenish Saturn’s E-ring. The implication was that there must have been some reasonably-sized source for that water, and now further measurements from several more Cassini fly-bys have confirmed that there is a huge body of water centred beneath the moon’s southern pole.
Content from our partners
