Mission Europa: What secrets will this moon of Jupiter reveal?
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Nasa’s Europa Clipper mission took off on 14 October to study Europa, one of Jupiter’s four moons discovered by Galilei Galileo in 1610. The Italian’s discovery came at great personal cost, but also spun off modern astronomy.
What we are about to find out in a few years will tell us whether there are any practical uses of Galileo’s 17th century discovery. It’s a tip of the hat, if you will, to not only the spirit of scientific enquiry, but also to, well, spirit itself—the need for gutsy dissent and debate. In Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, the astronomer, when accused of heresy, says, “The truth is the truth.
Is the Mother Church so fearful of science? Our Earth behaves as do all the wandering stars. I have observed that there are four moons that circle Jupiter in orbits of their own. So does our Moon the Earth as the Earth describes her orbit around the sun." To which, his Vatican interrogator replies, without a shred of evidence: “No.
You are deranged." This, for challenging the time’s orthodoxy that all heavenly motion was around the Earth. Evidence gathering is the aim of the US space agency’s Europa mission, which will work in tandem with Europe’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (or Juice), launched last year to study all four moons. Europa is encrusted in thick ice, as we have known since Voyager 1 and 2 sent us close-ups in 1979 revealing a gleaming white sphere.
Scientists now expect to find a 100km-thick layer of water and/or ice covering its rocky interior. It is reckoned to hold three times the quantity of all water on Earth. Does this oceanic moon also have vital elements that support life here—carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorous and sulphur? Probes
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