Sunday, April 27, 2014

Life On Exomoons

Even though the first exomoon-- a moon orbiting an exoplanet-- has yet to be discovered, a new study argues exomoons could also be habitats for life.

The simplest scenario would be for a large enough moon to be in orbit around an exoplanet which itself orbits in the habitable zone of its parent star, but there are other possibilities.  In our own solar system, for example, Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moons Titan and Enceladus are all candidates to support life even though they are all well beyond the Sun's habitable zone.

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