{"id":19241,"date":"2016-09-20T19:40:58","date_gmt":"2016-09-20T11:40:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/nasa-says-pictures-from-hubble-reveal-surprising-hints-of-europas-hidden-ocean\/"},"modified":"2016-09-20T19:40:58","modified_gmt":"2016-09-20T11:40:58","slug":"nasa-says-pictures-from-hubble-reveal-surprising-hints-of-europas-hidden-ocean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/nasa-says-pictures-from-hubble-reveal-surprising-hints-of-europas-hidden-ocean\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA says pictures from Hubble reveal \u2018surprising\u2019 hints of Europa\u2019s hidden ocean"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_276463\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-276463\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-276463\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/160920-europa-630x420.jpg\" alt=\"Europa's surface\" width=\"630\" height=\"420\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/160920-europa-630x420.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/160920-europa-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/160920-europa.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-276463\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An image from NASA\u2019s Galileo orbiter shows Europa\u2019s icy surface, crisscrossed by reddish-brown streaks of radiation-darkened salt. (Credit: NASA \/ JPL \/ Ted Stryk)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>NASA is gearing up to unveil \u201csurprising evidence\u201d of activity that may be related to the presence of a watery ocean beneath the icy surface of Europa, one of Jupiter\u2019s moons.<\/p>\n<p>In a&nbsp;media advisory sent out today, the space agency said the evidence comes from the Hubble Space Telescope, in the form of images taken during a \u201cunique Europa observing campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The findings are to be discussed at 11 a.m. PT (2 p.m. ET) Monday during a live-streamed teleconference involving four participants:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Paul Hertz, director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington<\/li>\n<li>William Sparks, astronomer with the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore.<\/li>\n<li>Britney Schmidt, assistant professor at Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.<\/li>\n<li>Jennifer Wiseman, senior Hubble project scientist at NASA\u2019s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Schmidt was part of a team of researchers who re-examined pictures of Europa that were taken by NASA\u2019s Galileo orbiter more than a decade ago. In 2011, they said dome-shaped features and bumpy patches of ice suggested that \u201cGreat Lakes\u201d&nbsp;of liquid water were trapped relatively close to the surface.<\/p>\n<p>The researchers speculated that&nbsp;the lakes would be created by interactions involving the surface ice, a deep ocean of warm briny water, and a rocky mantle even deeper below. Europa\u2019s&nbsp;plate tectonics could&nbsp;provide an assist.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Europa's Great Lakes - Britney Schmidt (SETI Talks)\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZTT42hbzUEI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\" data-ratio=\"0.5625\" data-width=\"800\" data-height=\"450\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px; width: 800px; height: 450px;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The way Schmidt sees it, such activity could provide the energy and chemicals required to sustain life. \u201cI argue that Europa is very much more Earthlike than other places that we think about,\u201d she said during a SETI Institute talk in 2012.<\/p>\n<p>As Monday approaches, it\u2019s virtually certain that we\u2019ll see \u201cLife on Europa?\u201d headlines cropping up. But direct detection of life isn\u2019t in the cards. It\u2019s far more likely that the Hubble imagery will reinforce the surface clues seen in Galileo\u2019s pictures.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps there\u2019ll even be evidence of geological changes that have occurred since&nbsp;Galileo\u2019s observations \u2013 changes that reflect shifts in the&nbsp;water beneath the ice. It wouldn\u2019t be aliens, but it would be surprising. Stay tuned\u2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An image from NASA\u2019s Galileo orbiter shows Europa\u2019s icy surface, crisscrossed by reddish-brown streaks of radiation-darkened salt. (Credit: NASA \/ JPL \/ Ted Stryk) NASA is gearing up to unveil \u201csurprising evidence\u201d of activity that may be related to the presence of a watery ocean beneath the icy surface of Europa, one of Jupiter\u2019s moons. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1874,1659,190],"class_list":["post-19241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-astrobiology","tag-europa","tag-nasa"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19241"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19241"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19241\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}