Thursday, July 14, 2016

Life on Jupiter's Moons?

Instead of globalization, should we be thinking about solarization, life in the solar system? A NASA photo just showed us 3 Jupiter Galilean moons: Io, Europa and Ganymede. They all are named for Greek myths.You might have guessed that they are called Galilean moons, because Galileo discovered them. But you need to do some research to find out if Jupiter has any more Galilean moons or any more moons at all.

     Of the three Galilean moons in NASA's photograph, Io is the closest to Jupiter and Ganymede is the farthest away. What does gravity have to do with these different distances? What else might influence these distances?

     You'll also have to do some research to find out if any of these moons could support life and what kind of life it would be. Knowing how far Jupiter and these moons are from the sun, we might think any life would have to be able to survive in very cold temperatures. But these moons have other interesting elements to consider. Io has 400 active volcanoes. Europa has shifting plate tectonics similar to those on Earth. Photos also show it has "water plumes" that signal the possibility of vast oceans under its surface. Ganymede, the largest moon in the solar system, is larger than Earth's moon, and it is the only moon with a magnetic field similar to Earth's.

     All in all, there's an interesting science project waiting here.

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