Jupiter’s ice moon probe will launch to search for signs of life on frozen moon | Technology | Central News Agency CNA

(Central News Agency, Kourou, French Guiana, comprehensive foreign report on the 12th) Could the solar system’s many vast and long-hidden oceans be filled with alien life? As Europe’s “Jupiter Ice Moon Probe” will launch to investigate Jupiter’s icy moon on the 13th, a new chapter in the human search for life outside the earth will also begin.

Italian astronomer Galileo Galileo first discovered Jupiter’s icy moons more than 400 years ago, and these moons are so far away from the sun that people have always thought that they could not be a back garden for life.

Athena Coustenis, a French astrophysicist and one of the scientific leaders of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission, told AFP that until recently , it is also believed that the habitable zone of the solar system “only ends at Mars”.

But NASA’s Galileo spacecraft’s 1995 visit to Jupiter and, more recently, the space probe Cassini’s trip to Saturn have opened scientists’ eyes.

It is correct to rule out the gas giants themselves, but their icy moons offer new hope for the discovery of life near Earth, especially Jupiter’s Europa and Ganymede. Ganymede), as well as Saturn’s moon Enceladus (Enceladus) and Saturn’s largest moon Titan (Titan).

Beneath the frozen surfaces of these moons are supposed to be vast oceans of liquid water, which we know is a key ingredient for life.

Nicolas Altobelli, project scientist for the European Space Agency’s Jupiter Ice Moon Probe, said it would be the “first exploration of a habitat beyond the freezing line between Mars and Jupiter”.

Atobelli told AFP earlier this year that beyond this line, temperatures plummet and “there is no longer any liquid water on the surface”.

The Jupiter Ice Moon Probe mission will launch tomorrow from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on an eight-year voyage of space exploration.

By July 2031, the Jupiter Ice Moon Probe will enter Jupiter’s orbit, where it will explore Ganymede, Europa, and another icy moon, Callisto.

Next, the Jupiter Ice Moon Probe will enter Ganymede’s orbit in 2034, making it the first spacecraft to orbit a satellite other than Earth.

In addition to being the largest moon in the solar system, Ganymede is also the only one with its own magnetic field, protecting it from dangerous radiation damage, and this is just one of several signs that Ganymede’s hidden ocean may provide a stable environment for life.

Unlike similar missions to Mars, which focus on finding signs of long-extinct ancient life, scientists hope that Jupiter’s icy moon still harbors organisms, even tiny or single-celled ones. (Translator: Li Peishan / Verified manuscript: Lin Zhiping) 1120412

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