Planetary scientists are a step closer to understanding changes in the puzzling jets of gas and dust grains observed shooting into space from cracks on the icy surface of Enceladus, a moon of Saturn.
First observed in 2005 by NASA鈥檚 Cassini spacecraft as it orbited the ringed planet, the plume is coming from a subterranean, salty ocean beneath the moon鈥檚 surface. The latest observations with NASA鈥檚 Cassini spacecraft now at Saturn by a team including CU-Boulder Professor Larry Esposito indicate at least some of the narrow jets there blast with increased fury when the moon is farther from Saturn.
Exactly how that is happening is far from clear, said Esposito, team leader for the the Cassini spacecraft鈥檚 $12 million ultraviolet spectrometer (UVIS) designed and built at CU-Boulder. But the observations give theorists new possibilities to ponder regarding the twists and turns in the plumbing beneath the moon鈥檚 surface. 听
Scientists are increasingly eager to understand the phenomenon, since the hidden ocean could have the ingredients for life.听
The latest measurements were made in March, when the UVIS instrument aboard Cassini was pointed toward Epsilon Orionis, the central star in Orion鈥檚 Belt. As Enceladus and its erupting plume drifted between the Cassini spacecraft and the star, UVIS measured how the water vapor in the plume dimmed the star鈥檚 ultraviolet light, revealing how much gas the plume contained.
Previous observations with Cassini鈥檚 cameras showed the eruptions were spraying about three times as much icy dust into space when Enceladus neared the farthest point in its elliptical obit around Saturn. But the new observations with UVIS showed the water vapor output 鈥� which makes up to 90 percent of the material in the plume 鈥� bumped up only about 20 percent.
Cassini cameras previously had shown the broad plume of gas and dust-sized ice grains are coming from the south pole region of Enceladus and extend hundreds of miles into space. Scores of narrow jets erupt along great fractures on the moon known as 鈥渢iger stripes鈥� are contributing to the plume.
Candy Hansen of the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona, part of the UVIS team, says the the new observations are somewhat perplexing.
"We went after the most obvious explanation first, but the data told us we needed to look deeper," she explains. 鈥淎s it turned out, looking deeper meant paying attention to what was happening closer to the moon's surface.鈥�
The UVIS team focused its attention on one jet known informally as 鈥淏aghdad I.鈥� The researchers found while the amount of gas in the overall plume didn't change substantially, this particular jet was four times more active than at other times in Enceladus' orbit, supplying about 8 percent of the plume鈥檚 total water vapor at its peak.
This insight revealed something subtle but important, says Esposito of CU-Boulder鈥檚 Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP).
鈥淲e had thought the amount of water vapor in the overall plume, across the whole south polar area, was being strongly affected by tidal forces from Saturn. Instead we find that the small-scale jets are what's changing.鈥�
This increase in the jets' activity is what causes more icy dust grains to be lofted into space, where Cassini's cameras can see them, Esposito explains.听
With new data Cassini has provided, the UVIS team is now relying on theoreticians.
鈥淪ince we can only see what's going on above the surface, at the end of the day it's up to the modelers to take this data and figure out what's going on underground,鈥� Hansen explains.
In March 2015 a team of Cassini scientists led by led by LASP Research Associate Sean Hsu showed that microscopic grains of rock emanating from Enceladus implied there is hydrothermal activity taking place within Enceladus. Such activity requires hot water, which scientists believe may enhance the possibility of life within the moon.
The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.听
