Oxygen found on one of Saturn's Moons, I don't know about the rest of you, but I find this exciting! Options

[Rust]

The Story

Two years ago, when NASA's Cassini Solstice spacecraft flew past the moon Dione, it noticed something familiar. Oxygen is present in Saturn's third-largest moon's exosphere (it's extended, tenuous atmosphere), and according to research published this week, Cassini's hi-tech "nose" had sniffed it.

Obviously, the first thing that springs to mind when discussing oxygen is that it's a pretty important component for life on Earth. But Dione, a barren and icy world, possesses few attributes that would make it suitable for life as we know it.

Although it is known to be composed of significant quantities of water ice, there is no indication -- unlike sister Saturn moon Enceladus -- that there is any sub-surface aquifer of liquid water. Liquid water is key to the evolution of life.

So why is the discovery of oxygen in Dione's exosphere important? If Dione's got it, then perhaps its sibling moons also have it, giving us a tantalizing clue as to the possibility of life on the natural satellites around Saturn and Jupiter.

"Some of the other moons have liquid oceans and so it is worth looking more closely at them for signs of life," Andrew Coates, of University College London and lead scientist of the study, told BBC News.

It is thought the oxygen is being produced via interactions between Saturn's powerful radiation belts and Dione's water ice. The radiation breaks the water molecules down, liberating oxygen into the moon's exosphere.

This most recent discovery will no doubt give a boost to scientists lobbying for sending missions to the gas giant's satellites to search for alien life as, like the presence of liquid water, the presence oxygen could support microscopic lifeforms on other, more habitable moons.

The Cassini research has been published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

This is awesome, and definitely warrants a closer look!

[Copper Bezel]

Is free oxygen actually important? Earth didn't have any when life started here. Intriguing, though.

[Destron D-69]

yeah, the existence of elements outside of earth... not big news,

another one of those "get the ones that partly remember high school science" excited news days.

finding air and water are not necessary for finding life.. they're requirements for the majority of the life we know about to GO there

(not to mention a few other things like gravity and air pressure) but, yeah... not surprising.

not to pooh pooh on your parade though Rust, but it's like making a news story about going to the house next door and being amazed that they have sheets on their bed too.

[crazyjw18]

It'd be more interesting if there was no easy explanation for it. Otherwise it's pretty meh. As stated before, life didn't start with a need for oxygen.

[Ave Destron!]

I guess the rest of us don't find this very exciting (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-fire.gif)

[Zek]

Guys, this is horrible news!



Those horrible made-for-women-TV-movies are spreading through the universe. The Omicronians are gonna see it in a thousand years and be pissed.

[Firebird1]

Should be interesting when exploring the outer solar system if we put a station or something out there. Right now not so much since we can only fling probes out there.

[The Predaking]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

[Vestras]

Well Predaking, It means Quaid already did his job. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-fire.gif)



But yea, Oxygen isn't saying much. Now, a Nitrogen Oxygen mix AND liquid water, then we're talking. Still, We need to do a lot more research and exploration of the Jovian and Saturnian systems. There's a lot of unknown unknown's about them.

[wonko the sane?]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

Too far away from a radiant light source to make it worth the effort. It also spends too much time hiding from the sun on the the other side of the saturn for it to take properly.

Does mean we could make a self sustaining colony out there. Oxygen is a hell of a lot like lego, once you got the basic blocks you can make a ton of stuff.

[NovaSaber]

Is free oxygen actually important? Earth didn't have any when life started here. Intriguing, though.

The fact that Earth wouldn't have free oxygen if it didn't have life first is actually exactly why finding oxygen in the right circucmstances (the lower atmosphere of a world whose surface doesn't get a lot of radiation, for example) could be evidence of life.

[Copper Bezel]

No, I get that. I mean, if it's actually being proposed that it's biogenic, then this is more than big. However, what's proposed above is that the oxygen is being produced from a non-biological process. If that proves wrong, then this could prove to be a very big deal. The presentation in the article that oxygen is needed for life is still wrong, and a supply of non-biogenic oxygen is probably not going make life substantially more likely on a world without liquid water, so it doesn't make Dione any more exciting by itself if we can explain its presence.

[D.M]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

It's smaller than our own moon soooo that would be pretty much impossible.

[wonko the sane?]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

It's smaller than our own moon soooo that would be pretty much impossible.

You think too small. It's not that large a celestial body: we could easily build a structure around the body that would allow us to flood the new space with earth atmosphere. Throw in some artificial sunlight and heaters and we got us a world in a bottle.

[D.M]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

It's smaller than our own moon soooo that would be pretty much impossible.

You think too small. It's not that large a celestial body: we could easily build a structure around the body that would allow us to flood the new space with earth atmosphere. Throw in some artificial sunlight and heaters and we got us a world in a bottle.

We're ceeeeeeeeeeeeeeenturies away from being able to do that. We still haven't even built a base on the Moon! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-blitz.gif)

[Esser-Z]

Seeing how fast we went from steam power to tablet computers, I'm not convinced centuries is quite right.

[wonko the sane?]

So what does this mean for Terra-forming it?

It's smaller than our own moon soooo that would be pretty much impossible.

You think too small. It's not that large a celestial body: we could easily build a structure around the body that would allow us to flood the new space with earth atmosphere. Throw in some artificial sunlight and heaters and we got us a world in a bottle.

We're ceeeeeeeeeeeeeeenturies away from being able to do that. We still haven't even built a base on the Moon! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-blitz.gif)

No, we haven't built a base on the moon because its an ecomonic sink with no real purpose at the moment. Once there's money to be made, there'll be entire cities up there and damn quick too. But our limitied knowledge of the geography of the moon currently leads us to believe that the only thing of worth up there is helium 3... and there's no market for it in volume.

[Canthros]

A user named Rust is excited to hear that oxygen has been found on either planets.

Did they find iron, too? Maybe he's hoping to connect with some long-lost family members?

[Rust]

A user named Rust is excited to hear that oxygen has been found on either planets.

Did they find iron, too? Maybe he's hoping to connect with some long-lost family members?

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