Scientists have discovered a hidden ocean on the moon of Uranus – there is potential for life there

A group of American scientists mapped the surface of Uranus’s satellite, Miranda, and also modeled tidal pressure mechanisms on it and concluded that there may be an ocean of liquid water in the depths of this moon.

Image source: nasa.gov

The thickness of the ocean on Miranda, according to scientists, is at least 100 km, and it has existed for the last 100–500 million years. True, it is not located on the surface of the planet, but at a depth of about 30 km. To support their hypothesis, scientists say that if the water on Miranda were completely frozen, certain types of cracks would appear on the surface of the satellite, indicating the expansion of the frozen ocean from the inside. But a study of available images of the moon showed that there are no such cracks.

One of the images of Miranda was taken by the American Voyager 2 spacecraft, which flew past it in 1986. The image showed the moon’s rough surface covered with grooves and craters, which scientists believe were caused by tidal forces and the moon’s internal heating. Based on surface features, the scientists modeled Miranda’s interior—they analyzed stress and shear mechanisms to infer the internal forces that might have shaped its appearance. The deep ocean, in their opinion, could have arisen as a result of the appearance of a thermal pulse when the orbit of the moon changed as a result of its gravitational interaction with other satellites of Uranus.

«Such a deep ocean could have made Miranda very similar to [Saturn’s moon] Enceladus and potentially habitable in the geologically recent past,” the researchers say.

admin

Share
Published by
admin

Recent Posts

Nvidia stock is no longer the best performer – MicroStrategy soars 500% in a year thanks to Bitcoin

Last Wednesday, trading volume in MicroStrategy shares exceeded that of Nvidia and Tesla. The company,…

9 minutes ago

Tired of waiting: sales of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl exceeded one million copies within two days of release

The post-apocalyptic open-world shooter S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl from the developers from the GSC…

59 minutes ago

TSMC to start producing 1.6-nm chips in two years

TSMC's plans for the next couple of years remain largely unchanged - by the end…

59 minutes ago

YouTube has added the Dream Screen feature to Shorts – an AI background generator for videos

The YouTube administration announced that the updated Dream Screen feature is now available in the…

1 hour ago

PCs with AI reduce user productivity – people do not know how to properly communicate with AI

Users of PCs with artificial intelligence systems demonstrate lower productivity compared to those who work…

1 hour ago