If I could travel anywhere…it would be Europa

Europa NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft captured the images used to make this high-resolution mosaic of Europa in 1979. The mosaic has been rotated 90 degrees clockwise from its original orientation.Image: NASA/Ted Stryk/Edited by The Planetary Society

If you’re curious about the existence of extraterrestrial life, you may want to take a deeper look at Europa. It’s one of Jupiter’s four largest moons, of its 95 moons. On the surface, it doesn’t appear to be that special. Its icy exterior is similar to many other icy moons, albeit the surface is smoother than other moons. But, once you get underneath the exterior, that’s where scientists believe possibilities lie.

Under the icy ridges of the surface, scientists believe there is a huge salty ocean, kept warm by the gravitational pull of Jupiter. And like our planet, Europa is thought to have the basic elements that we believe are necessary for life, such as hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulfur. 

Europa’s seafloor might host hydrothermal vents, where heat and minerals create conditions that, on Earth, teem with life. The volcanic or hydrothermal activity on the seafloor could supply nutrients that could make the ocean suitable for living things. If life can thrive in the depths of our oceans, there is hope that the conditions would allow for life in Europa’s ocean floor as well. 

There are active missions to Europa that scientists hope will yield some answers. In 2023, The European Space Agency (ESA)launched its “Juice” mission to study Jupiter and its three largest moons, Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa and its potential for habitability. They will arrive in Jupiter in July 2031. 

In 2024, NASA launched its first mission, the Europa Clipper, designed to conduct a full study of Europa to determine whether conditions exist to support life. Europa Clipper will travel 1.8 billion miles to reach Jupiter in April 2030. It will conduct flybys and orbit Jupiter, scanning the moon’s surface and atmosphere. 

The discoveries that NASA’s Europa Clipper and ESA’s Juice could make will be life-changing, reshaping how we see the universe.