Saturn has 146 confirmed moons– more than any other planet in the solar system – but one called Enceladus stands out. It appears to have the ingredients for life.
From 2004 to 2017, Cassini– a joint mission between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency – investigated Saturn, its rings and moons. Cassini delivered spectacular findings. Enceladus, only 313 miles (504 kilometers) in diameter, harbors a liquid water ocean beneath its icy crust that spans the entire moon.
Geysers at the moon’s south pole shoot gas and ice grains formed from the ocean water into space.
Though the Cassini engineers didn’t anticipate analyzing ice grains that Enceladus was actively emitting, they did pack a dust analyzer on the spacecraft. This instrument measured the emitted ice grains individually and told researchers about the composition of the
As a planetary scientist and astrobiologist who studies ice grains from Enceladus, ...
