NASA spacecraft will explore Jupiter's icy moon in search of conditions that support life

• NASA's Europa Clipper spacecraft is set to explore Jupiter's moon Europa, a leading candidate for finding life beyond Earth.
• Europa Clipper will assess whether Europa's conditions, such as its ocean beneath an icy crust, could support life.
• The spacecraft, NASA's largest built to study another planet, will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.

A NASA spacecraft is ready to set sail for Jupiter and its moon Europa, one of the best bets for finding life beyond Earth.

Europa Clipper will look beneath the moon's icy crust, where an ocean is thought to slosh quite close to the surface. It will not search for life, but rather determine whether the conditions there could support it. Another mission would be needed to eliminate the microorganisms lurking there.

“It's an opportunity for us to explore not a world that could have been liveable billions of years ago, but a world that could be liveable today, right now,” said program scientist Curt Niebur.

NASA RELEASES CLEAREST VIEW OF MARS, BLUE ROCKS SEEN IN THE LANDSCAPE

Its huge solar panels make Clipper the largest spacecraft built by NASA to investigate another planet. It will take five and a half years to reach Jupiter and will come within 16 miles of Europa's surface, considerably closer than any other spacecraft.

Liftoff is scheduled for this month aboard SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket from NASA's Kennedy Space Center. Mission cost: $5.2 billion.

Europa, the superstar among Jupiter's many moons

Europa, one of Jupiter's 95 known moons, is almost the size of our own moon. It is encased in a layer of ice that is estimated to be 10 to 15 miles thick or more. Scientists believe this icy crust hides an ocean that could be 80 miles or more deep. The Hubble Space Telescope has detected what appear to be geysers erupting from the surface. Discovered by Galileo in 1610, Europa is one of Jupiter's four Galilean moons, along with Ganymede, Io, and Callisto.

Seeking conditions that sustain life.

What kind of life could Europe support? In addition to water, organic compounds are necessary for life as we know it, as well as a source of energy. In the case of Europa, these could be thermal vents on the ocean floor. The project's deputy scientist, Bonnie Buratti, imagines that any life would be primitive, like the bacterial life that originated in Earth's deep ocean vents. “We won't know from this mission because we can't see that deeply,” he said. Unlike missions to Mars, where habitability is one of many issues, Clipper's only job is to establish whether the moon could support life in its ocean or possibly in some pocket of water in the ice.

Large spaceship

When its solar wings and antennas are deployed, Clipper is about the size of a basketball court (more than 100 feet from end to end) and weighs nearly 13,000 pounds. Large solar panels are necessary due to the distance between Jupiter and the sun. The caravan-sized main body is equipped with nine scientific instruments, including ice-penetrating radar, cameras that will map virtually the entire moon, and tools to extract contents from Europa's surface and tenuous atmosphere. The name is reminiscent of the fast sailing ships of past centuries.

Circling Jupiter to fly across Europe

The indirect journey to Jupiter will span 1.8 billion miles. For added thrust, the spacecraft will pass Mars early next year and then Earth in late 2026. It will reach Jupiter in 2030 and begin scientific work next year. As it orbits Jupiter, it will pass Europa 49 times. The mission ends in 2034 with a planned crash against Ganymede, the largest moon of Jupiter and also of the solar system.

Overflights of Europe pose huge radiation risk

There is more radiation around Jupiter than anywhere else in our solar system besides the sun. Europa passes through Jupiter's radiation bands as it orbits the gas giant, making it especially threatening to spacecraft. That's why Clipper's electronics are inside a vault with dense aluminum and zinc walls. All this radiation would wipe out any life on Europa's surface. But it could break down water molecules and perhaps release oxygen into the ocean, which could possibly feed marine life.

Earlier this year, NASA panicked that the spacecraft's numerous transistors could not withstand the intense radiation. But after months of analysis, engineers concluded that the mission could proceed as planned.

Other visitors to Jupiter and Europa

NASA's twin Pioneer spacecraft and then two Voyagers passed close to Jupiter in the 1970s. The Voyagers provided the first detailed photographs of Europa, but from quite a distance. NASA's Galileo spacecraft made repeated flybys of the Moon during the 1990s, passing as close as 124 miles. Still in action around Jupiter, NASA's Juno spacecraft has been added to Europa's photo album. A year after Clipper, the European Space Agency's Juice spacecraft, launched last year, will arrive at Jupiter.

Ganymede and other possible ocean worlds

Like Europa, Jupiter's huge moon Ganymede is believed to host an underground ocean. But its frozen layer is much thicker (possibly 100 miles thick), making it more difficult to probe the environment beneath. Callisto's ice sheet may be even thicker and possibly conceal an ocean. Saturn's moon Enceladus has geysers shooting, but it is much farther away than Jupiter. The same goes for Saturn's moon Titan, which is also suspected of having an underground sea. While no ocean world beyond our solar system has been confirmed, scientists believe they exist, and may even be relatively common.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Messages in a cosmic bottle

Like many previous robotic explorers, Clipper carries messages from Earth. Attached to the electronics vault is a triangular steel plate. On one side is a design labeled “water words” with representations of the word water in 104 languages. On the opposite side: a poem about the moon by American poet laureate Ada Limón and a silicon chip containing the names of 2.6 million people who signed up for indirect travel.