'Water on Pluto moon'

[glenc (Glen)]

As a planet, Pluto was a real dog. Now scientists say there may be something truly fishy about one of the little world's three known moons.
Astronomers have announced they have evidence that, despite the bitterly cold conditions on the edge of the solar system, Pluto's moon Charon may have an underground ocean of liquid water, triggering speculation it could harbour marine life.
The water appears to be spewing up through cracks in the surface, producing spectacular geysers that instantly freeze, creating showers of ice.
Using Hawaii's giant Gemini Telescope, the astronomers found that the 1200 kilometre-wide moon is covered in patches of water crystals, and ammonia hydrates.
The crystals appear fresh, suggesting ice geysers, or ice volcanoes, must be erupting every few hours or days.
The observations point "consistently to cryo-volcanism, which brings liquid water to the surface, where it freezes into ice crystals," said Jason Cook, from Arizona State University. "That implies that Charon's interior possesses liquid water."
Radioactive materials could be melting Charon's interior ice, producing the water.
More at:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/...559914231.html

[Gargoyle_Steve (Steve)]

That's a great link Glen, thanks for posting.

It's amazing enough to think that Charon may contain liquid water, let alone the possibility that underground marine life forms may exist whose ecosystem ultimately derives it's energy from radioactive sources instead of sunlight.

We would never have considered such a possibility once upon a time, however discovery of the biosystems surviving around those deep ocean "hot spring" volcanic vents, and then the discovery of primitive life forms based on chemical energy in the hypersaline brine pools has allowed us to consider all sorts of alternatives to a sunlight based ecosystem.

Of course the makers of some Japanese monster movies had conceived of life forms surviving on radiation as a source of life back in the 50's!!