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habitability of the icy galilean satellites:

habitability of the icy galilean satellites:. J. Chela-Flores The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy and Instituto de Estudios Avanzados , Caracas, Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela. evolutionary Biomarkers with EJSM and penetrators.

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habitability of the icy galilean satellites:

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  1. habitability of the icy galilean satellites: J. Chela-Flores The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy and Instituto de EstudiosAvanzados, Caracas, RepublicaBolivariana de Venezuela. evolutionary Biomarkers with EJSM and penetrators

  2. Resurfacing on Europa: a key in the searchforevolutionarybiomarkers

  3. A first Earthanalogof Europa’sicysurface: Ellesmere Island

  4. Second and thirdEarthanalogsof Europa’sicysurface

  5. H TaylorValley

  6. Resurfacing on terrestriallakes: How do microbialmatsreach the bottomof the lakeicy surface? Prostrate matscarrying a consortiaofbacteria some notyetidentified

  7. Resurfacingon terrestriallakes: How do microbesreachfrom the bottomto the top of the lakeicy surface? Microbial mats Microbialmats on the surfaceof Lake Hoare, Taylor Valley Microbialmat

  8. Resurfacingon terrestriallakes: Trafficofbiogenicsulfurthrough the lake’sicy cover Dry Valley lakes Quantityofchemicalelements (in kgs per year)

  9. BiogenicSulfurin the Solar System • Sulfurisstronglyfractionatedexclusivelyby • biogenicactivityin theavailablesamplesof • the Solar System The delta34S-parameter Sulfate coexisting with seawater -40 • Terrestrial sources (biogenic) in basins off California Meteoritic Lunar • Wehaveshownhowbiogenicsulfurpatches are producedbyresurfacingofan • Earthanalogof Europa: Lake Hoare

  10. Resurfacingon Europa:A dustcloudhasbeenreleasedbymicrometeroidimpacts Credits: Miljković, K. and Taylor, E. A. (2007), The LAPLACE Consortium (Blancet al, 2009) and McCordet al. (1998)

  11. Possible sources of the stains • External source: Ions may be implanted from the Jovian plasma. • Internal source: Sulfur may be due to microbes • living around hydrothermal vents, reaching the icy • surface by cryovolcanism. • What is the nature of biogenicity? • One way to decide may be with penetrators. • Could the source of the patchesbebacteria, or • eveneukaryotes or metazoans?

  12. Whicheukaryotes, ormetazoans, can live in extreme environments? (deVereet al. 2003-2010) • Expose-E was carried back to Earth by Space Shuttle Discovery. These experiments investigate to what extent terrestrial organisms are able to cope with extreme environmental conditions. • XanthoriaElegans, the elegant sunburst • lichen,was outside the European • Columbus laboratory. It is a macroscopic • composite of a fungus and an alga. Expose-E experiment unit outside (18 months) Europe’s Columbus ISS lab module. The American elegant sunburst lichen

  13. Some extremophiles are more complex than single-celled eukaryotes Animals with bilateral symmetry found in extreme environments include the Antarctic krill

  14. Another extreme metazoan: Tardigrades (water bears) (0.1-1.0mm in length, water-dwelling, segmented animals) Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of Echiniscustestudo, a marine species

  15. Northern Rock Crawler Grylloblattacampodeiformis For most of the year, these ice insects remain frozen

  16. Simple aquatic metazoans in extreme conditions • In the Antarctic analog of Europa there is an ecosystem with simple metazoans. • Our ecosystem is underneath McMurdo Sound:

  17. Metazoans living underneath the icysurfaceofMcMurdo Sound

  18. Withcurrrentinstrumentation, howcouldwe test foreukaryotes or metazoans in the Europanocean? Credit: Richard Greenberg, “Europa”, Springer 2005

  19. Credit: British Penetrator Consortium Penetrator

  20. Penetrators for the icy surface of Europa For geochemical data: Credit: UK British Consortium

  21. Combined Raman/LIBS spectrometer (ExoMars) The instrument design has a total mass smaller than 2kg

  22. The EuropaJupiter System Mission with penetrators Io JEO JGO Europa Callisto Ganymede

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