Uranus' 4 biggest moons may have buried oceans of salty water

[Admin]

The four biggest moons of Uranus — Titania, Oberon, Ariel and Umbriel — may harbor salty oceans beneath their frozen surfaces, a new study suggests.

Uranus' 4 biggest moons may have buried oceans of salty water : Read more

 

[rod]

The ref paper cited is very interesting reading too; https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2022JE007432 .

I noted some comments about life in the paper. "Hence, this kind of ocean may not be of great interest for astrobiology, although one cannot rule out that certain life-forms may be able to thrive in this environment."

That is a key concept concerning moons in our solar system. Note this recent report. The Six Moons Most Likely to Host Life in Our Solar System, https://www.scientificamerican.com/...most-likely-to-host-life-in-our-solar-system/

Here are the 6 moons reported in this article. At Jupiter, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto are listed. At Saturn, Enceladus, and Titan. At Neptune, Triton. Astrobiology as a science has come a long way from Charles Darwin warm little pond postulate in some private letters from the early 1880s where non-living matter in a warm little pond on Earth could evolve into the first, living cell, life's last common ancestor by natural processes and create the evolutionary tree of life seen in the fossil record and life on Earth today. Using the 6 moons listed, the origin of life on the moons would need to survive all the early catastrophism of the solar system and giant planet building with the widespread impacts postulated now in the MMSN and accretion disc. NASA astrobiology section acknowledges Charles Darwin warm little pond scenario for the origin life too. https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/news/exposed-in-a-warm-little-pond/, 06-Dec-2018. "A recent study examines volcanic islands on the ancient Earth as a potential location for Darwin’s ‘warm little pond.’

 

[Unclear Engineer]

The interesting thing for me is the apparently high probability of water on planets.
At one time, it seemed that scientists were wondering where all the water on Earth could have come from. Now, it seems more like where does all the water go on the inner planets? Solar radiation seems to mostly be the answer to the inner planet's water loss. So, I am wondering how muc water Earth actually had when it first formed. Were there continents above water 4.6 billion years ago?

 

[rod]

Remember Unclear Engineer, all the impacts now in the early solar system so the game is catastrophism and violent bombardments. The Earth does not form with oceans all over or land masses or continents, it was a proto earth before Theia hit it making the Moon according to current modeling. Many more impacts continued, and the Precambrian from 4.5 to 2 billion years ago, some 10x more impacts. Various reports on space.com about this too. So, water must be delivered via impacts and giant impacts, as well as the early Sun, Faint Young Sun. According to the May issue of Sky & Telescope on novae and r-process elements, it took 160 million supernova of massive stars to give us the oxygen we have on Earth today to breathe. Violent, catastrophism must be accepted according to the science in the modeling using natural processes to explain our origins, not just solar radiation. Even Theia impact can cause real trouble for the proto earth and continued growth to what we see today.

 

[rod]

So, Charles Darwin warm little pond evolved in science into violent catastrophic bombardments and impacts, that created us So much has changed now since the early 1880s when Charles Darwin stated this for the origin of life on Earth.

 

[rod]

The interesting thing for me is the apparently high probability of water on planets.
At one time, it seemed that scientists were wondering where all the water on Earth could have come from. Now, it seems more like where does all the water go on the inner planets? Solar radiation seems to mostly be the answer to the inner planet's water loss. So, I am wondering how muc water Earth actually had when it first formed. Were there continents above water 4.6 billion years ago?

Folks may enjoy reading some of the past, space.com reports on how Earth got its water.

Meteorites reveal how they brought space water to Earth, https://forums.space.com/threads/meteorites-reveal-how-they-brought-space-water-to-earth.59018/

 

[Unclear Engineer]

I havr read those reports. Remember, they are all highly speculative. The most recent reports about the amount of water under the crust surface on Earth, plus the water-on-the-moon and the water on Mars articles make me wonder how much of that previous speculation is off-base. The apparent thinking along the lines of water on large moons (but not as large as Earth's) seems to add reason to wonder what does and does not control how much water various planetary bodies end-up with.

For one thing, has anybody really addressed the amount of "shade" that a planetary nebula / protoplanetary disk gives the dust and gas at various radii from the star, perhaps allowing protoplanets to draw in water or ice as they form, and then letting it differentiate as he planet/moon stratifies its material into core/mantel/ocean/etc.?

 

[rod]

"I havr read those reports. Remember, they are all highly speculative. The most recent reports about the amount of water under the crust surface on Earth, plus the water-on-the-moon and the water on Mars articles make me wonder how much of that previous speculation is off-base."

Interesting comments here in post #7 by Unclear Engineer. Here is an example from 2013 on the giant impact for the origin of the Moon, and Earth's magma ocean that formed vs. our nice, water planet today.

Giant Moon-Forming Impact On Early Earth May Have Spawned Magma Ocean, http://www.livescience.com/41061-moon-crash-earth-magma-ocean.html, "LONDON — Billions of years ago, the Earth's atmosphere an opaque and the planet's surface was a vast magma ocean devoid of life."

 

[rod]

In ref to my post #8, it is important to remember that a proto Earth model is used for Theia impact creating the Moon. That proto Earth is smaller in mass and slightly smaller in radius. A proto Earth 0.65 earth mass and radius 0.9 earth mass, escape velocity about 9.5 km/s. More water could be blasted off into space and then more water must be added again as the proto Earth slowly evolves into the present Earth we see today. Nothing like Charles Darwin warm little pond model.

 

[Unclear Engineer]

What if the Theia model is wrong? Not saying that it is - just that it is a model based on some observations and a lot of assumptions. Even if there were a collision big enough to create the moon, did it have to create a magma ocean? Could it have been a less destructive collision that created a nearly double planet more by capture than destruction? (I say nearly, because the Moon is not big enough to be called a planet.) How about a glancing blow that left most of the two bodies intact, rather than making a cloud of debris that coalesced into the Moon?

 

[rod]

What if the Theia model is wrong? Not saying that it is - just that it is a model based on some observations and a lot of assumptions. Even if there were a collision big enough to create the moon, did it have to create a magma ocean? Could it have been a less destructive collision that created a nearly double planet more by capture than destruction? (I say nearly, because the Moon is not big enough to be called a planet.) How about a glancing blow that left most of the two bodies intact, rather than making a cloud of debris that coalesced into the Moon?

Yes, origin science models can be wrong but showing that they are wrong is difficult and challenging. The Theia impact model also creates a synestia phase of the early earth - all molten in simulations too.

The moon formed inside a vaporized Earth synestia, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/02/180228103238.htm

Nature all by itself, avoiding the very serious catastrophism of impact modeling now is a must to show how Charles Darwin warm little pond evolved calmly, and non-living matter could slowly evolve into a single cell tiny life form that became the evolutionary tree of life. This report shows moons at Uranus, the paper leaves the door open for life on some and another report I cited shows 6 moons now in the solar system where life could evolve via natural means and live there too. IMO, origin science like this, needs to put all the pieces together and show how nature using violent impacts, created our very livable Earth and not invoke a miracle. You previously indicated speculative here and I agree.

 

[Unclear Engineer]

I am not seeing any incompatibility between even the Theia collision model and the Darwin model of a warm pool of water, somewhere, with the inorganic molecules in it that are needed to form a living organism. If a Theia collision produced what we have today, then clearly there have been warm pools of water created after the collision damage coalesced into Earth and the Moon, because we have warm pools of water, today. Similarly, asteroids seem to have significant water in them, but appear to be composed of shattered protoplanetisimals. Why didn't they lose their water?

All I am advocating is that people think broadly, recognizing what parts of models are assumptions as well as knowing the supporting facts. Getting intellectually hung-up on a single theory tends to make people ignore other possible models until their favorite model is "disproven". It is more "scientific" to consider a variety of models and see how new information affects the apparent probability that each is true.

 

[rod]

I am not seeing any incompatibility between even the Theia collision model and the Darwin model of a warm pool of water, somewhere, with the inorganic molecules in it that are needed to form a living organism. If a Theia collision produced what we have today, then clearly there have been warm pools of water created after the collision damage coalesced into Earth and the Moon, because we have warm pools of water, today. Similarly, asteroids seem to have significant water in them, but appear to be composed of shattered protoplanetisimals. Why didn't they lose their water?

All I am advocating is that people think broadly, recognizing what parts of models are assumptions as well as knowing the supporting facts. Getting intellectually hung-up on a single theory tends to make people ignore other possible models until their favorite model is "disproven". It is more "scientific" to consider a variety of models and see how new information affects the apparent probability that each is true.

"..because we have warm pools of water, today."

Good and interesting thinking here Unclear Engineer. My observation, what we see today on Earth like a warm little pond is nothing like the postulated, violent catastrophism for the early Earth, starting about 4.5 Gyr and now through about 2 Gyr into the Precambrian where asteroid and meteorite impacts could be at least 10x more frequent, long after the postulated Theia event (which avoids another Theia or more large bodies that could show up for the proto-Earth still evolving in mass and size). Just some items I keep track of in my home database when I read various origin science models presented.

 

[michael678]

The four biggest moons in our solar system – Jupiter's Ganymede and Callisto, and Saturn's Titan and Enceladus – may be hiding a surprising secret: oceans of salty water buried beneath their icy exteriors. Scientists have long suspected that these moons could harbor liquid water oceans due to their unique geologic features and the presence of subsurface oceans on other icy moons. Recent research has provided more new evidence to support this theory, with data from NASA's Galileo and Cassini missions suggesting that Ganymede and Enceladus, in particular, may have subsurface oceans that contain more saltwater than Earth's oceans. These findings have important implications for the search for extraterrestrial life, as subsurface oceans could potentially provide a suitable environment for microbial life to thrive.

 

[rod]

The four biggest moons in our solar system – Jupiter's Ganymede and Callisto, and Saturn's Titan and Enceladus – may be hiding a surprising secret: oceans of salty water buried beneath their icy exteriors. Scientists have long suspected that these moons could harbor liquid water oceans due to their unique geologic features and the presence of subsurface oceans on other icy moons. Recent research has provided more new evidence to support this theory, with data from NASA's Galileo and Cassini missions suggesting that Ganymede and Enceladus, in particular, may have subsurface oceans that contain more saltwater than Earth's oceans. These findings have important implications for the search for extraterrestrial life, as subsurface oceans could potentially provide a suitable environment for microbial life to thrive.

michael678, this does follow the report by sciam about the 6 moons, and Uranus could have a moon like this too. A new model for the habitable zone is out too, WHERE TO LOOK FOR LIFE: HOMING IN ON THE HABITABLE ZONE, https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/where-to-look-for-life-homing-in-on-the-habitable-zone/

These are two exoplanet sites I use and study.

http://exoplanet.eu/, and, https://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/index.html

Are there confirmed exomoons that fall within the HZ or PHZ areas of the host stars now?

 

[rod]

FYI, on my post #15, there is one exomoon listed now.

An Exomoon Survey of 70 Cool Giant Exoplanets and the New Candidate Kepler-1708 b-i, https://arxiv.org/abs/2201.04643

The Extrasolar Planet Encyclopaedia — Exomoon Kepler-1708 b-i

World's most comprehensive interactive database of extrasolar planets updated daily since 1995. Detailed information on planet Exomoon Kepler-1708 b-i orbiting around star Kepler-1708.

exoplanet.eu