NASA made some significant advancements in the search for extraterrestrial life this week. First, SpaceX launched NASA's Europa Clipper, which will eventually make about 50 flybys of Europa, the moon of Jupiter that scientists believe has ice-covered oceans that are twice the volume of Earth's. Second, NASA scientists published a paper in Nature describing computer modeling that predicts the presence of “radiatively habitable zones within exposed mid-latitude ice on Mars.” If there's water in those ‘radiatively habitable zones’, “mid-latitude ice exposures could represent the most easily accessible locations to search for extant life on Mars.”

I'm 54. I'm beginning to think it's entirely possible, that in my lifetime, we'll have evidence of extraterrestrial microbial life.

What a time to be alive.

tags: science space mars europa

postposted by matt in Saturday, October 19, 2024