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作成日: 2023/10/09 12:23

更新日: 2025/12/08 22:46

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Has the James Webb Space Telescope found signs of life on Europa?
Mark R. Whittington, opinion contributor
12 hours ago

Recently, NASA announced that the James Webb Space Telescope has discovered carbon dioxide at a specific location on Europa’s icy surface in a disrupted “chaos terrain” called the Tara Regio. The discovery has great implications for the possibility of life on the moon of Jupiter.

Europa is one of the largest moons in the solar system, featuring an icy surface covering a salty ocean that may contain life. The famous Italian scientist Galileo discovered Europa in January 1610 with his homemade telescope. Europa has already been examined closely by a number of robotic spacecraft, particularly the Galileo probe that orbited Jupiter between 1995 and 2003.

The European Space Agency launched the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) in April, which is expected to enter Jupiter space in July 2031. NASA is planning to launch the Europa Clipper in October 2024 with a planned arrival at Jupiter in April 2030. It will orbit Jupiter, doing numerous flybys of Europa during its mission.

The presence of carbon dioxide is one more piece of evidence that Europa’s subsurface ocean may be an abode of life. Carbon is the basis of all life on Earth, as NASA notes. Animal life eats carbon and exhales carbon dioxide that is in turn consumed by plants, which expel oxygen in an endless cycle. Carbon is the fourth most abundant element in the universe.

Neither the Europa Clipper nor the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer is likely to find definitive proof that Europa’s subsurface ocean contains life, but it may confirm that it has the elements necessary for life. These elements include heat, which, because the ocean is shielded from the sun, is provided by a phenomenon called tidal flexing. Jupiter’s gravity stretches and compresses Europa’s icy shell, thus likely generating enough heat to sustain a warm, interior ocean. The tidal flexing also could cycle water and nutrients between the icy shell, the ocean and the rocky interior, creating conditions for life.

NASA has developed a concept for a Europa Lander which, so far, has remained unfunded. The lander would take samples of the ice crust about four inches beneath the surface and then analyze them in an onboard laboratory. The lander would also carry a seismometer that would monitor geologic activity in Europa’s icy crust.

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