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Home Science & Tech

Saturn’s moon Enceladus

July 9, 2021
in Science & Tech
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Saturn’s moon Enceladus
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In news- NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has detected an unusually high concentration of methane, along with carbon dioxide and dihydrogen, in the moons of Saturn.

Key updates-

  • The spacecraft has found that Titan has methane in its atmosphere and Enceladus has a liquid ocean with erupting plumes of gas and water.
  • An international research team has used new statistical methods to understand if methanogenesis or methane production by microbes could explain the molecular hydrogen and methane. 
  • The team gave a set of conditions, including dihydrogen concentration and different temperatures to understand if microbes would grow. 
  • It has opined that methane could be formed by the chemical breakdown of organic matter present in Enceladus’ core. 
  • On Earth, hydrothermal vents on seafloors are known to release methane, but this happens at a very slow rate. 
  • However, this hypothesis is plausible but only if Enceladus was formed through the accretion of organic-rich material from comets.
  • The results have suggested that methane production from hydrothermal vents is not sufficient to explain the high methane concentration detected by Cassini.

About Encledaus-

  • Enceladus is the sixth-largest moon of Saturn.
  • It is mostly covered by fresh, clean ice, making it one of the most reflective bodies of the Solar System. 
  • It has a wide range of surface features, ranging from old, heavily cratered regions to young, tectonically deformed terrains.
  • It was discovered on August 28, 1789, by William Herschel,
  • The two Voyager spacecraft, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, passed nearby in 1980 and 1981.
  • In 2005, the Cassini spacecraft started multiple close flybys of Enceladus, revealing its surface and environment in greater detail. 
  • In particular, Cassini discovered water-rich plumes venting from the south polar region.
  • According to NASA scientists, the plumes are similar in composition to comets.
  • In 2014, NASA reported that Cassini found evidence for a large south polar subsurface ocean of liquid water with a thickness of around 10 km.
  • On June 7, 2021, astronomers reported detecting substantial amounts of methane, a possible sign of microbial life, on Enceladus.

About Titan moon-

  • Titan is larger than the planet Mercury and is the second largest moon in our solar system. 
  • It is the only one moon in the solar system with a substantial atmosphere.
  • Titan’s atmosphere is made mostly of nitrogen, like Earth’s, but with a surface pressure 50 percent higher than Earth’s. 
  • It is the only place besides Earth known to have liquids in the form of rivers, lakes and seas on its surface.
  • The largest seas are hundreds of feet deep and hundreds of miles wide. 
  • Beneath Titan’s thick crust of water ice is more liquid, an ocean primarily of water rather than methane.
  • Titan has no known moon, but it’s possible for a moon to have moons. 
  • Titan has no rings, while some of Saturn’s moons create rings around the planet. 
  • Three other spacecraft – Pioneer 11, and Voyagers 1 and 2, studied Titan while flying by Saturn. 

Titan’s air is dense enough that one could walk around without a spacesuit but an oxygen mask is needed.

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Source: Indian Express
Tags: Indian expressPrelims

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