Space & Astronomy

An uncanny resemblance to the Death Star might not be the only intriguing thing about Saturn’s moon Mimas. It could also harbor a vast ocean of liquid water beneath its pockmarked exterior.

A new look at data from NASA’s Cassini probe reveals that the point in Mimas’ orbit where it comes closest to Saturn changed slightly over 13 years, researchers report February 7 in Nature. Because Mimas’ internal composition affects the gravitational dance between the moon and its planet, these orbital dynamics, along with some previously seen moon wobbles, point to a liquid interior, astronomer Valéry Lainey of the Paris Observatory and colleagues say. More

Around 2.5 million years ago, an asteroid may have exploded over Antarctica. 

The evidence comes from a chemical analysis of more than 100 tiny pieces of rock entrained within the White Continent’s ice, researchers report in the Feb. 1 Earth and Planetary Science Letters. The timing makes the midair detonation the oldest known airburst, the team says. Only two other ancient airburst events are known in the geologic record, dating to 480,000 and 430,000 years ago (SN: 3/31/21).   More

Future interplanetary explorers beware: Hitchhiking bacteria brought to Mars on human bodies might not only survive the harsh conditions on the Red Planet’s surface but also potentially thrive.

Recent experiments exposed four common disease-causing microbes to a simulated Mars-like environment, with its lack of water, scant atmospheric pressure, deadly ultraviolet radiation and toxic salts. The bacteria remained alive for various periods of time and, in some cases, even grew in the imitation Martian sands, researchers report in the January Astrobiology. More

After nearly three years, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, the first spacecraft to undertake a powered flight on another world, has ended its mission. Officials at the agency confirmed on January 25 that the history-making quad-copter has sustained damage to one of its rotor blades and is no longer capable of flying.

“While we knew this day was inevitable, it doesn’t make it any easier,” said Lori Glaze, NASA’s planetary science division director, during a news conference on the status of the quad-copter. More

Mercury’s surface might not be quite so terra firma, at least on geologic timescales.

The closest planet to the sun is a world sculpted by volatiles — ephemeral compounds that can freeze, flow or float into space over time, analogous to water on Earth. Salt, the primary volatile on Mercury, appears to have reshuffled the planet’s landscape over billions of years and might even flow — very slowly — in glacierlike landforms, researchers report in the November Planetary Science Journal. The volatile could possibly even form habitable niches deep underground, the authors speculate. More

SAN FRANCISCO — For those delighted by the possibility of alien life, Enceladus, the wintry moon of Saturn, is a gift that just keeps giving.

Key compounds that could support alien microbes or help life emerge have been detected in the enormous plume of water that erupts from vents in Enceladus’ icy shell, biophysicist Jonah Peter of Harvard University reported December 15 at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting. These include hydrogen cyanide, which can be toxic to humans, though Peter noted it’s also “a key building block for synthesizing more complex compounds including amino acids, sugars and nucleobases, which in turn are precursors for proteins, RNA and DNA.”

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The findings are good tidings for the NASA team developing the Exobiology Extant Life Surveyor, or EELS, a snakelike robot that could one day crawl into Enceladus’ frozen crust to seek out signs of life in the ocean below.

Though that ocean has never been directly observed, it is thought to be the source of the huge water plume spouting from Enceladus’ south pole (SN: 6/9/23). Researchers had previously reported that the plume contains phosphorous in the form of phosphate, establishing Enceladus as the first alien ocean world known to possess all the elements essential for life (SN: 12/16/23). The detection of phosphorus bolstered the moon as a prime candidate for hosting extraterrestrial life, and the new findings from Peter’s team offer even more support.

With hydrogen cyanide and phosphate, “Enceladus might be seen as a favorable prebiotic system,” or a chemical setting capable of giving rise to life, said Christopher Glein, a geochemist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio who was not involved in the study.

Peter and colleagues conducted a detailed analysis of data collected by NASA’s Cassini probe as it flew through Enceladus’ plume in 2011 and 2012. In addition to hydrogen cyanide, the spray contains acetylene, ethane and various alcohols, the team also reported December 14 in Nature Astronomy. These compounds fuel some microbes on Earth, Peter said, “and could supply large amounts of metabolic energy for any potential life” on Enceladus.

Though NASA has no missions scheduled for Enceladus, its habitability has already spurred the development of EELS. The 100-kilogram, 4-meter-long robot consists of ringed, cylindrical segments. These pieces can be angled and rotated in different ways to make EELS slither, sidewind or move vertically inside crevasses.

The EELS robot (seen here) operates on the snow at the Big Bear Mountain Resort in Southern California, during a field test in February 2023.JPL-Caltech/NASA

The robot’s most recent field test occurred in September, on the Athabasca Glacier in Alberta, Canada, reported technologist Masahiro Ono on December 13 at the meeting. On the glacier, Ono, of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and his colleagues tested the vertical mobility of EELS inside three ice shafts, or moulins. The robot first succeeded at holding itself steady in the moulins, unfurling its body to lodge itself between the frozen walls. Then, by carefully rotating treaded rings on its body, EELS safely completed multiple 1.5-meter descents.

Following further tests on the glacier, the next step for EELS might be Earth’s moon. For instance, a small version of the space snake could be deployed to assist stationary lunar landers, Ono said. This robot “is a game changer,” he said, “and not just for Enceladus.” More