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Aside from Earth, no planets in the solar system are known to harbor life. Mars, Europa, and Titan are considered to have once had or currently have conditions permitting the existence of life. Multiple rovers have been sent to Mars, while Europa Clipper is planned to reach Europa in 2030, and the Dragonfly space probe is planned to launch in 2027.
While Earth is the only place in the Universe known to harbor life, [10] [11] estimates of habitable zones around other stars, [12] [13] along with the discovery of thousands of exoplanets and new insights into the extreme habitats on Earth where organisms known as extremophiles live, suggest that there may be many more habitable places in the ...
To support an Earth-like atmosphere for about 4.6 billion years (Earth's current age), a moon with a Mars-like density is estimated to need at least 7% of Earth's mass. [20] One way to decrease loss from sputtering is for the moon to have a strong magnetic field of its own that can deflect stellar wind and radiation belts.
Outside the HZ, tidal heating and radioactive decay are two possible heat sources that could contribute to the existence of liquid water. [16] [17] Abbot and Switzer (2011) put forward the possibility that subsurface water could exist on rogue planets as a result of radioactive decay-based heating and insulation by a thick surface layer of ice ...
Life on Europa could exist clustered around hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor, or below the ocean floor, where endoliths are known to inhabit on Earth. Alternatively, it could exist clinging to the lower surface of Europa's ice layer, much like algae and bacteria in Earth's polar regions, or float freely in Europa's ocean. [ 188 ]
A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying NASA's Europa Clipper space probe launches from Kennedy Space Center on Oct. 14, 2024, on a mission to orbit Jupiter and study its icy moon, Europa, for signs ...
"It's certainly true on Earth − deep, deep mines host life, the bottom of the ocean hosts life," he said. "We haven't found any evidence for life on Mars, but at least we have identified a place ...
At least two-thirds of Mars' surface is more than 3.5 billion years old, and it could have been habitable 4.48 billion years ago, 500 million years before the earliest known Earth lifeforms; [4] Mars may thus hold the best record of the prebiotic conditions leading to life, even if life does not or has never existed there.