In the following short essay I will try to convince you that out of Titan, Enceladus, Mars, and Europa, Titan is the most likely planetary body to support life while Mars is the most unlikely. First let’s talk about what a planetary body requires in order to support life.
In order to support life, a planetary body needs water or liquid, a protective sphere, and organic compounds. In addition to these vital entities we must also take in consideration the notion of origin of life and its maintenance. Origin of life requires a minimal complexity that may exceed what can be produced by natural process. That means that during a natural process on any active body, just a little tweak of a random natural effect can produce life given that its primitive ingredients are present. Now the more important and harder to achieve part is to maintain life. Maintenance requires a complex energy converting system that keeps life alive. For example, take fossil fuel, a human, and the idea of transportation. There is no way to turn that fossil fuel into energy and use it as transportation if we didn’t have a car with an engine that burns the gas and produces enough energy to operate. In this example, the conversion mechanism is maintaining the idea of transportation. Just like how we would never be able to survive if we hadn’t had a stomach and a cycle of energy. That being said, let’s now examine our candidates.
Unlike what a certain Mr. Soare believe, I think that Mars is, as it’s dubbed, a “dead” planet. Thanks to our beloved Phoenix Lander, we are now sure that there is ice on Martian surface. And we also learnt that we could grow asparagus in Martian regolith. But is that enough? Martian atmosphere is not strong enough to protect life. There are no tectonic activities that could kick start a complex intra planet activity. The slow erosion rate suggests a planet-wide infertility. There is a lacking of organic compound on Mars. Even if there was a life formed, it wouldn’t be easy for Mars to support it.
Europa has a frozen ice core. Although it doesn’t have a protective atmosphere, the ice core acts as its shield from the radiation. When studied, its surface structure suggests that some sort of internal reaction forces its outer surface ice to shape. There are even eruptions of water on Europa. That means that there must be some sort of internal heat process in Europa’s core. This internal energy source can provide resources to life forms under water. It is too hard to speculate and verify that theory since Europa is not easy to get to. We also do not know if there are any organic compounds on Europa. Hence Europa takes a tumble in our list.
Enceladus has ice all over its body and it has water. NASA’s Cassini data suggested that there were water fountains on the moon. Even carbon has been reported being present at poles. But we are not aware of any complex organic compound. It has a protective atmosphere that can guard the moon. But the lack of organic compound really hurts its chances of life.
Lastly, Titan’s fluid cycle of methane and ethane, its strong protective atmosphere, and the presence of organic compound makes it the best candidate for supportability of life. There is a lot going on at Titan that shows a stable environment for life. There are impact basins and ridges that suggest ongoing tectonic activities. Strong winds, sand dunes, and flowing rivers suggest some sort of a seasonal pattern. So far it sounds too good, but the only thing that lacks is a kick start. The hydrocarbons that are found on Titan are known to be the building blocks of amino acids, and amino acids as we all know are the building blocks of life. Some say that Titan is too perfect to have an origin of life process. Maybe it does require some sort of a kick-start, but nevertheless, it is the most supportable planetary body among the four mentioned above.
Life with Hot Cake! Now thats interesting.
Life with “chum-chum”, yummy!
Very interesting.