2023-06-16 15:50:00
Phosphate, a key component of life, has been discovered on Saturn’s icy moon ‘Enceladus’ and is attracting attention.
An international research team led by Professor Frank Postwerk at the Free University of Berlin in Germany published an article in the scientific journal Nature on the 14th (local time) using observational data from NASA’s Saturn probe Cassini, “Enceladus. “Phosphate, an essential building block for life, was found in ice grains ejected from the Earth.”
Enceladus, one of over 100 moons orbiting Saturn. It is a small satellite with a diameter of 505 km and regarding the size of England, but scientists began to observe and pay attention to the eruption of a water column in 2005 from the satellite’s south pole.
The surface of Enceladus is covered with ice, and a sea with a depth of 10 km is estimated to be 40 km underground between the lower and central rock layers. There are cracks in the Antarctic ice sheet, through which water droplets and ice fragments from the ocean are ejected into space.
Through previous studies, organic compounds including abundant minerals and amino acids related to life were found in these ice grains, but phosphorus, an essential substance for all life on Earth, was not found. Phosphorus is a component of DNA and RNA, energy carriers, cell walls, and bones and teeth.
However, through this study, phosphorus, an essential element for life, was confirmed in the form of phosphate. In particular, it is estimated that it is at least 100 times higher than the Earth’s ocean, raising the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
Dr. Christopher Glein of the Southwest Research Institute (SWRI), a co-researcher, said, “As a result of the 2020 geochemical model experiment, it was estimated that there would be a lot of phosphorus in the Enceladus sea. “The actual discovery of evidence of phosphate predicted by model experiments is very exciting and represents an important step forward in astrobiology and the search for extraterrestrial life,” he said.
“The high phosphate concentration in the Enceladus sea appears to be due to the high solubility of phosphate minerals in the sea,” he said. “This result means that the Enceladus sea meets the strict requirements for the existence of life. It is to check whether there is an ocean where life can actually exist.”
Electronic Newspaper Internet Reporter Seo Hee-won shw@etnews.com
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