Picture an ice-covered landscapesuper jili, rough and rocky. Plumes of water vapor erupt from the surface. Tendrils of algae lurk in the bright white glaciers. Leagues below the surface, microorganisms and other creatures cluster near hydrothermal vents, fissures in the ocean floor where life can thrive.

This could be the scene on Europa, a moon of Jupiter where life could have sparked like it did on Earth.

We may have a chance to discover if this is really the case. Very soon, NASA will launch the space probe Europa Clipper, one of the most ambitious missions in its storied history, to investigate Europa’s potential to harbor life. Its findings may help confirm, as some would expect, that all life in the universe originates through a shared evolutionary pathway. Or the investigation may stumble on something radically unexpected that suggests life can take root in far more ways that we’ve only begun to comprehend. Either discovery would force us to reconsider much of what we know about biology and the origin of life.

Clipper is one of the most vital astrobiology projects yet aimed at answering the question of whether we are alone in the universe — a goal that should be NASA’s highest priority. The agency is best known for its human exploration missions, sending astronauts into orbit and to the surface of the moon, and being the driving force behind the International Space Station (which has been occupied by humans continuously since 2000). NASA hopes to resurrect the glory of Apollo with Artemis, its successor lunar exploration program to send astronauts back to the moon. But rather than pursue self-mythologizing goals of colonizing other worlds, NASA should do more to invest in and develop missions that more directly and intimately study extraterrestrial life and make them the lodestar of the agency.

Advertisement

Our cosmic backyard is brimming with planets and moons that might be ripe for alien life-forms to flourish. Astrobiologists think Europa is one of the most promising places to find extraterrestrial life despite its harsh conditions unsuitable to humans. The moon is believed to be encrusted with a 10-to-15-mile-thick ice shell. Sunlight cannot penetrate more than a few meters. Europa’s surface temperatures at its Equator at midday never rise above a frigid negative 225 degrees Fahrenheit. Its thin oxygen atmosphere provides no shield for the incessant radiation; even wearing a spacesuit, a human being would be hit with a lethal dose in under 24 hours.

Yet Europa seems to have the ingredients needed to stimulate life: watersuper jili, hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and phosphorus. These elements are churning together in a liquid water ocean sitting below the icy shell and warmed thanks to the massive friction induced by Jupiter’s awesome gravity. These conditions could have seeded strange cousins of earthly life-forms in the ocean’s depths near hydrothermal vents.

• can
• super jili
• Just
• We
• Please