There’s one simplification in the cross-section of Europa’s ocean in this video - the ocean floor is effectively level. This is a fair assumption. (We haven’t even confirmed that a water ocean exists.) But every other Solar System body that has/had volcanic or other thermally induced rock activity - Earth, Mars, Io - has mountains. If there is significant variation in Europa’s ocean floor elevation, that could be even MORE beneficial for its habitability. Different depths create different environments and niches where life could form. Higher areas may also be less impacted by any salts that deposit on the deeper ocean floor. And if there are blocks of rock that are differentiated and more felsic, they could be lighter and stay higher than other areas, exposing the ocean to a different rock chemistry. Europa could have amazing variety within its ocean. It will be so exciting to find out whatever is there!
What a great point! I think the models try to keep things simple until know parameters like the topography of the ocean floor. But if what I was saying about the hydrothermal systems does turn out to be occurring on Europa, then you are absolutely right that there would be some major topography changes along the sea floor and that could increase habitability both from a physical point of view, but also a chemical one. There would be physical niches like you mention, but also chemoclines that would provide a different chemical environment depending on depth. What a fun thought experiment! :D
Another stellar presentation. You make it very easy to absorb the information. I find the Deccan traps to be a fascinating topic. And also, how Ireland retains a huge piece of America in geologic terms. So much to learn.
Water is so cool... it's effectively incompressible, there are at least 21 types of ice, Ice-I(sub-n), Ice-I(sub-c) all the way to Ice-XIX, and a newer one called "square ice", all of which form under different conditions. Ice-VII is what's likely at the bottom of a couple moons oceans. Always enjoys your work.
I know right! The first time I learned about all the different ice polymorphs I was so impressed :D It's such a one of a kind liquid (& solid) lol! And thanks, glad you enjoyed it ;)
This made me think of Kurt Vonnegut's famous novel "Cat's Cradle", where a scientist figures how to make ice crystals that are stable over zero degrees at Earth's normal surface pressure conditions. Of course, everyone dies. 😅 In the novel, the hypothetical ice polymorph is called Ice-Nine.
Utterly fascinating video! I've just discovered your channel and subscribed immediately. Perhaps unusually, I recently got interested in (terrestrial) geology through it's 'exo' variant. As a very passionate meteorite collector I (ridiculously) know more of extra-terrestrial rocks than I do about the ones under my feet (as a physicist I don't really have much formal education in geology). I am sure that your videos will help remedy this situation somewhat. If you are interested, I have a very extensive collection of high resolution macro photos of most if not exactly all of the huge variety of meteoritic material. I would love to see, for example, the visual comparison between extra-terrestrial rocks and their closest terrestrial analogues.
Hiiii.... I love these topics but currently don't have time ...but I will definitely watch all of your videos as soon as I get free. They are so good ❤️ Thank you 😊
I’m new here and loving the channel! Not trying to upset the apple cart here but is it possible in the video as you discuss topics to mention verbally or show on the screen citations for good papers which support what we know (or are inferring from the data) on each of the conclusions we have about the icy moons? I’d love to get to know the literature and also the researchers in this field better. Thanks again for putting out such great videos!
Trust me, I am good about this for some videos and so bad about it for others, I'm sorry! I will try to be better about adding the citations right next to the statements ;) I lost motivation to do this because it seemed when I put them, many people didn't have access, so I just stopped, but you've re-motivated to do this, so I'll try and be better about this, and if people can't access them it's the journal's fault not mine haha!
@@GEOGIRL It's not the journal's fault, it's intended by the probably owner, the infamous Rupert Murdoch. Restricting access to science and education is one of his fetishes. I suggest linking the research articles not in those journals with paywalls but in the open sci-hub managed by the hero Alexandra Elbakyan.
Based on your recommendation I picked up a copy of the “Alien Oceans” book and I’m loving it! Since that book was written a couple years ago the spectra debate still seemed quite open. Any idea on if JWST is being used to get better error bars on the spectra for Iogenic sulphur versus the indigenous salts?
Ooo that's a great question! I am not sure, but I will look into what JWST is looking at for those moons. However, my guess is even though JWST is AWESOME, it is still way further away than Voyager, Galileo, and Cassini were when they were in the outer solar system, so I doubt that we will get more precise data from JWST. The only thing that will give us that is Clipper and other missions that plan to go to the Jovian system.
@@GEOGIRL JUNO data may help to a small extent with Europe a bit as well. It's not designed to do that, but it's amazing what repurposing NASA engineers have been able to do with their spacecraft.
al those different fields of science come together, the amazing power of the human mind and working together. serious... i love science. thanks for sharing the knowledge geo girl!
NOTE TO NON-MEMBERS OF THIS CHANNEL - Over the past 2 days, Geo Girl has uploaded FOUR (!!!) full videos for channel members to view early. These are all amazingly informative and well researched. (And they're about dinosaurs!) She is super intelligent, she knows her stuff, she does the research and work necessary to make these great videos, and most importantly, she is clearly committed to the long-term success of this channel. So, please subscribe and become a channel member! Geo Girl is awesome!
Thanks, this is probably the best video on Europa's ice dynamics that I've seen. Great explanations. I still think there is no life native to Europa, due to initial conditions not being very favourable to biogenesis (too cold in general, even around potential "smokers", and organic molecules not concentrated enough). But I'm moderately confident that Earth-originated life might be able to survive there if we were to bring it.
Yea, I think there is some worry about transferring something from Earth to Europa and that's one of the reasons that we have a hard time justifying a lander over a flyby. But the good news is it's way harder to do so on an outer solar system mission compared to an inner solar system because the chances of anything surviving that trip go way down :)
@@GEOGIRL Super interesting topic. I would suspect that your usual bacterial wouldn't care very well even after reaching destination. Anything that is not anaerobic, and an extremophile, would just stand on Europa's ice, inert, waiting to be recycled. Now, we can find potential Earth analogs for 3 possible biomes on and under the surface of Europa. But maybe we should look at conditions before the GOE to be totally fair. We have to look at conditions that never really existed on Earth, though. An Earth with low ocean temperatures, low oxygen, and high concentration in ocean iron (among other dissolved minerals). This would be a hybrid of pre-GOE Suderian chemistry coupled with Hutonian global temperatures. I don't think there was ever a slushball Earth prior to the GOE and iron precipitation. No surface life, no rocks of biological origin (chalk, etc), no white sands, and surface weathering brings pretty much anything into the ocean. Non oxygenated, high ions seawater must have had a peculiar color, possibly dirty and opaque. What biomes do we have? 1. Cold, high salinity, high dissolved ions seawater with iron, sulfur, etc. 2. Warm seawater near hot spots (smokers), with lower saturation point. 3. Surface ice and snow, partially or totally exposed to solar radiation. On Earth, prokaryotes living in surface ice and snow are rather interesting. Glaciers in Antarctica for instance. They live in water that is not from the sea but from surface weather (precipitation). Where do they get their carbon, where do they get their phosphorus? Volcanic ashes and atmospheric CO2. Even in an atmosphere without oxygen, if there is volcanism there is ash. So, ice is not completely barren. Life near black and white smokers has been studied a lot. Extremophiles who like heat and elements such as sulfur and iron. Life in cold brine, I haven't read enough to know the fine details. I'd say cold halophiles would be a very interesting research subject. (I'm also interested in the chemical contribution of volcanic ash on organisms living in surface ice.) This is not looking good for Mars, thinking of it. It's a dead world, very dry on the surface, with no liquid water anywhere, no volcanism and no internal heat source. The only thing it has going is surface iron oxide and moderate solar radiation. Not very friendly to life, zero biome out of three. Europa doesn't have an atmosphere, no surface volcanism, but has internal heat. This we can consider the brine seawater biome, as well as the deepwater smokers. In your opinion, what Earth extremophiles exactly would be "interested" in a Europa vacation? Sulfur eating, iron eating, cold halophiles? Other types? Have we detected phosphorus in Europa ice "streaks"? Please note that I am not an expert, just interested in the topic. Thanks.
What is the basis for the low organic molecules concentration assumption? I would possibly expect the opposite. From carbonaceous chondrite meteorites we know that the early outer Solar system material (including vicinity of Jupiter and beyond), compared to the inner rocky planet material, was actually extremely rich in wide variety of organic chemicals including amino acids and nucleobases. So "raw materials" for life should have been even more readily available on Europe compared to Earth.
From the lowest staging site in Europa's ice, we are just above the surface of the water, preparing a mission into the depths. There is evidence of a mollusk like higher life form similar to that of a cephalopod. The water is roiling, (eerie music plays in the background) In a whispering voice.... "Let's get out of here?"
It's amazing how soon we'll have a Europa spaceprobe to Europa - like in a couple of years! And! it has a submarine thing that they are hoping to to get under all that ice and have a look around! There's a live webcam of them building this Europa probe. It's usually pretty boring. i'm there for maybe thirty seconds!
Hi , Hope you are doing great i just want some answers regarding phd from USA Universities like what is minimum qualification, does they provide accommodation, does they provide stipend to non American phd students , what is the criteria for selection of phd in Top universities like what should we do to get into it and please also make one video on your daily routine like how a phd student spend there day we will love it Thank you 👍
I am doing great thanks! I will try to answer your questions, but just be aware my answers are based on my experience and may be missing information that other US universities use. 1. I know that the minimum qualification depends on which University, but for the most part as long as you have your Bachelors you qualify. 2. If by 'accomodation' you mean housing, not in my experience. For the most part you have to find and pay your own living costs (however, the living costs are typically covered by your salary or stipend if you are a TA or RA, see below). 3. Yes, they pretty much all provide a stipend or salary if you are on an assistantship (this means, you are a phd student, but also an employee of the university either as a research assistant, RA, or a teaching assistant, TA). Most of the time, the payment will cover both tuition and living. But sometimes, it doesn't cover both, so keep an eye on that. As for non American students, in my experience (at UTEP, which has a lot of students from Mexico), they are also paid the same as American students if they are either a RA or TA. And sometimes, they can even find additional scholarship money from funding opportunities that are specifically targeting minority groups, so keep an eye out for those as well. 4. The criteria for selection includes: your grades (past transcripts), your application (the essays you wrote for your application), your recommendation letters (both who they are from and what they say, make sure the people you get to write a recommendation really know you well), your previous awards and honors, but most importantly previous research experience. In my experience, having done undergraduate research was my biggest selling point, they like that a lot because a student that has never done any research before is a bit of a wild card for them and they'd rather go with a student they can trust with research. 5. Okay, so this wasn't one of your questions, but I also just want to say a BIG thing you need to do when applying to PhD programs is contact the professor that you want to work with. You will need an advisor in grad school and if you contact them ahead of time (even before you apply), it makes the process so much easier and also makes the school want you more because if they have a professor that wants you they will accept you with no hesitation. For example, I contacted 10 different professors from 10 different universities before I applied. Then after getting to know the professors over email a bit and see if they even had any openings for a phd student, I applied and then eventually picked one and had to call the rest to tell them I wouldn't be going there, but trust me having to tell them no is way more fun than you being told no, so contact professors ahead of time, that is my best advice ;)
@@GEOGIRL Thanks a lot unlike other youtubers you give value to your subscribers I am your subscriber since you have around 1.5 k subscriber but even after having 10 k subscriber you still reply to every comment and that is great thing I didn't get one thing I know about research Assistance but if you are a phd student aren't you already a research assistant aren't all PhDs are automatically research assistant??
@@mi4208 Not necessarily. I mean you are technically an unpaid research assistant, correct, but being funded by a research assistantship position is different. For example, some of my semesters they've paid me as a research assistant if my advisor has enough grant money because then I can focus all my energy on my research. Whereas, other semesters, they pay me as a teaching assistant when my advisor doesn't have enough grant money to fund me as a research assistant. As a teaching assistant, I still have to work on my own research, but I also have to teach and technically I am only being paid to teach during those semesters. I hope that makes sense. Also, thank you for the kind words and for following me for so long
I’ve been waiting for probes to find life in Europa for decades. I’m running out of time here. I’m eager to see what the Europa Clipper mission will find when it launches in a couple of years. Fingers crossed I’ll last the decade to see the results. :)
Is it possible the surface layers are absorbing the salts, creating a vast body of pure water below? As if the salts and other components are attracted to the already collected material topside. Just a thought of imagination.
I have no idea, but that's an interesting thought! My hunch is probably not... just because ice that freezes from salt water is always more fresh than the water because that's the only way it would be stable. But I am only speaking in terms of Earth conditions, so on europa, who knows! ;D
I've thought about eventually selling merch, but I figured no one would want a shirt that says Geo Girl haha, please let me know if I am wrong about that ;) My other thought was to sell merch with certain science related or nerdy sayings, but I don't think I have any catch phrases yet on my channel. Maybe I'll just wait and see ;)
Yes, but unfortunately I think most of the models suggest that Callisto's ocean is sandwiched by ice, and without water-rock interactions, there would not be a good chance of life there :( But who knows, maybe the rocks find a way to come into contact with the water!
Just a thought I had while binge-watching the planetary geology series on Europa: If the dark markings in the cracks and fissures of europa's ice crust are the result of salts coming out of solution as water escapes and evaporates ( or freezes out and snows down on another part of the surface), wouldn't that mean any sub surface ocean would be hypersaline? The salty ice would eventually be subducted back down to the subsurface ocean, but any water that made it to the surface would be gone forever.
Sure, any particular rock types in mind, or just all alkaline rocks? And any particular topic in mind (e.g., their formation, their depositional environments, sedimentary alkaline rocks, igneous ones, etc.)? :)
The thing that really interests me is the possibility of both vulcanism and cry-volcanism. Fifteen percent of IO's surface is covered with volcanoes compared to the 29% of earths surface that is covered by land . . . If the interior oceans of Europa and Ganymede follow a similar pattern on their hidden surface that would create a very unique set of environments with quite a lot of power for heat based or methan/sufur based chemosynthesis. This is complete speculation but I'd picture a very rough interior surface filled with "black smokers" that send chemicals up into strong currents powered by the different water temperatures, and eventually many of those chemicals being sprayed onto the bottom surface of the outer ice shell. I'd love to see what that looks like . . . how do you have waves or distribute thermal energy in a completely enclosed ocean where you can't have tsunamis, rogue waves, and hurricanes? What is the weather like? Do you have ices melting, condensing and then falling like rain? I feel life is likely, there probably are basalts down there that could form RNA but . . . That's almost a bonus when we are looking at a set of conditions this exotic. There is so much to learn there.
I want us to explore here the most out of any other place. With ROV mission's, upgraded data transfer tech ability. Etc. I'm so facinated with geologically diverse and complex systems, like Pluto, Io, Ganymede, Enceladus, Titan. Anything is more interesting & better than Mars. I'm so tired and bored of Mars lol sorry not sorry. I just want to see what scientific discoveries we could find in other places in our solar system. Plus we've put so much time in to Mars and hardly anything has come from it. (Except for maybe learning we need to figure out how to make better ROV devices for missions idk?) Just joking around but I really wish things could go faster, I'm so curious and I'd love to see some things occur during my lifetime... But sadly I know things take a lot of time and trial and error process... Darn it.
Absolutely fascinating! Just the fact that liquid water can exist so far from the Sun, is staggering. From a dummy's standpoint... wouldn't the water HAVE to be highly saline, to remain liquid in those low temperatures? You've excited my Curiosity, Rachel!! 😊
Well the heating of the Earth may be primarily from solar radiation, but on moons like Europa, heating comes primarily from tidal stree rather than solar radiation. Tidal stress is from the gravitational pull of Jupiter (and other moons) on Europa which stretches and strains it so much that it provides enough heat to maintain a liquid water ocean :) Tidal heat is also why Io is so volcanically active!
I sure hope so! But I'd be spectical given the lack of atmosphere on Europa, and the spectral signatures of the colored regions which indicate salt... But who knows, anything is possible ;D
Non-ice is exciting, but that room is not. We could send you some posters, or like a Mars globe or something? You deserve it, you have 10.9k subscribers. You shouldn't be the only thing lighting that space up.
Haha! Trust me, I've wanted to spice up my room for my videos for a while now, but unfortunately the window, which is my lighting, faces the wall with the doors, so nothing is hanging there. I've always wanted to have a rock display in the back of my videos but don't have one in this apartment (it's back in my old room at my parents house until I find it a more permanent home). But I am open to suggestions of how to make my current background more exciting. I don't have any other options on location right now because I have a roommate, but I'll be moving in January so maybe my new place will have more potential :)
When you said: "don't go assuming that aliens are green humanoid"... I was like: of course not, in Europa they must be like cod and sardine, shark and squid... and then I happily went on imagining the complicated fishing industry of the future: how the EuroCod[TM] was perfectly salted and frozen (both for good measure) because everything is so cold that it has no problem until you have to resend it from substation Moon to Earth, that's tricky, as happens with all outre space economic supply opperations, that's why Musk lost all his money (in the future of course): his gold, and platinum and lithium, mithrill and unbelievium mined in the asteroids was never licensed to land on Earth because of the Gravity Catastrophe Prevention Law, so he had to sell it as jewelry to Moon tourists at a loss. Anyway, then I got asleep (video was over by then, worry not) and then I got up and re-listened to that fragment and you said something about microbial. At first I was a bit frustrated but then I realized that would solve the Gravity Catastrophe Prevention Law conundrum, as the microbial fish would be under the threshold of the law, you can dump them on Earth's atmosphere one by one or even 10 by 10... it's less clear when how or where they fall but cooking time should be enough. 🤣
@@imneverwrongsometimestruthlies Unfortunately no, but like I mentioned in this video, there's a lot we could learn about the ocean from the ice and plumes at the surface :D
What if we don't find life there? Even microbial? What could be the harm in introducing life to Europa environment and running some experiments? Would they then be called Europeans? Would we have to supply them with croissants and baguettes? BTW, I agree with Girish Kumar Verma...
Haha Thank you. And I think that we take so many precausions when it comes to preventing transmission, I'm not at all worried that that would be an issue, especially because we aren't sending a lander to Europa any time soon. But even if we do, I think we will manage to keep things abiotic. I think that if we don't find life on Europa, that is just amazing a discovery as if we do. BUT only if we prove that there is none. It's unfortunately almost impossible to prove that there is no life on a planet or moon because you'd have to search every inch, and then there's always the possiblity that you are search with equipment that cannot detect a different kind of life than ours. So I doubt we will every be able to say "there is no life on Europa". I love the analogy of taking a bucket of ocean water from Earth''s ocean and looking in it. There is no life, no fish, no nothing (at least to the naked eye), but that's because we just took one little bucket when there is a whole ocean full of life out there. So I think we will always just keep searching :)
As for youtubers confusing organic material with biogenic: I relatively recently unsubscribed a channel that confused this. It makes me think the channel is a desinforming one.
GC, Call Me Old Fashioned but Surely We Should Send a Mission to Europa and Drill ??. Drill Down Get some Cores Bring back to Earth or Space Base on Mars and Study. Get More Certainty.
I asked this question on an old video but, being afraid you don't look at old comments, I decided to ask again. I've had this question for at least 30 years. WHY DOES MENSTRUATION MATCH THE MOON? Obviously, it not just about women because many mammals have 28 day cycles. I know its old. I know it happened when we were influenced by ocean movements. But where is the benefits? Please answer me someone. Make a video? Perhaps it evokes embarrassment. Please be above it. In my youth I was embarrassed when it was pointed out how often men think of sex. Now I realize we wouldn't be here without it so 40 years after being embarrassed I am now proud that I think of it so often. lol
Probably spawning in estuaries, which is inherently a tidal event. To make sure all us reproductively compatible inner fishies showed up to the orgy on the same tide, evolution probably used lunar light signals to set a circadian type biological clock. Different species may have used low light new moon spawning tides, while others high light full moon tides, but likely the biochemical clock was the same. Interestingly, ancestral tetrapods seem to have had a 3rd light sensing "eye" on the top of the skull. Hard core modern throwbacks like the tuatara still have a functioning one. Most of us modern terrestrial tetrapods just kept the pineal gland clock and bone plastered over the optical window.....
@@NullHand Thank you for this reply. In a former video I asked the same question. She said that there was nothing causal. I did some research and proved the relationship from a resent study and mentioned it to her. After more research I learned that it wasn't as old as I thought. As it turns out the hypothalamus in our brain dictates the pattern. It is hooked into our biological clock as you mentioned. WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN FOR 30 YEARS. LOL This year marks my 43 archery season. I know how the shorter days start the release of hormones which start a deer's reproductive phase (as it does in plants and other things.) I see so many things that reflect our relationship with the oceans (from waves eliminating stress to fish food being good for us, being the only ape who can float, and many others). Thanks again. btw how did you know all of this?
Something I can never wrap my head around is how much material is lost through Geysers/Plumes (Enceladus as well)? Is material deposited back onto the surface, but there is an important non-zero depletion of resources which is lost to space, Io, Jupiter. What percentage of the total amount of water is lost over a billion years?
Well I read that even though Io's mass loss rate is about ~2,200 lbs (1000 kg) per second, that comes out to only about 0.3% of it's total mass in it's lifetime (~4.5 billion years, assuming it formed when all the other planets/moons did). So it seems like a lot but really over time it doesn't account for much when put in relative terms to how big these moons are (of course, they seem small compared to Jupiter, but again it's all relative haha). I think for Enceladus, and especially Europa, the amount lost is much less. I think I read about 200kg/sec for Enceladus. But since it is much smaller, that would account for 30% of it's initial mass if it had been going on for 4.5 billion years. However, Enceladus and Europa's plumes may only be intermittent meaning not always emitting material, so it's hard to know for these moons how much they've lost, but since they started out as mostly water and still are, it would be hard for them to loose all their water like Io has. Anyway, hope that answers your question :)
For all of those we really don't know yet moments, I'm looking forward to your videos in late 2024 / early 2025, when we get the probe data back and can fill in a lot of these blanks for us. 🛰️🤓 🛰️
There’s one simplification in the cross-section of Europa’s ocean in this video - the ocean floor is effectively level. This is a fair assumption. (We haven’t even confirmed that a water ocean exists.) But every other Solar System body that has/had volcanic or other thermally induced rock activity - Earth, Mars, Io - has mountains. If there is significant variation in Europa’s ocean floor elevation, that could be even MORE beneficial for its habitability. Different depths create different environments and niches where life could form. Higher areas may also be less impacted by any salts that deposit on the deeper ocean floor. And if there are blocks of rock that are differentiated and more felsic, they could be lighter and stay higher than other areas, exposing the ocean to a different rock chemistry. Europa could have amazing variety within its ocean. It will be so exciting to find out whatever is there!
What a great point! I think the models try to keep things simple until know parameters like the topography of the ocean floor. But if what I was saying about the hydrothermal systems does turn out to be occurring on Europa, then you are absolutely right that there would be some major topography changes along the sea floor and that could increase habitability both from a physical point of view, but also a chemical one. There would be physical niches like you mention, but also chemoclines that would provide a different chemical environment depending on depth. What a fun thought experiment! :D
Another stellar presentation. You make it very easy to absorb the information. I find the Deccan traps to be a fascinating topic. And also, how Ireland retains a huge piece of America in geologic terms. So much to learn.
You are doing a great job ❤️ keep doing this.
I'm currently in my second year of Bachelors in geology, your Channel is really helpful for me.
Thanks so much!
A hug from Brazil to you!!
I'm marathoning all your videos and I'm loving it and of course... learning a lot!!
Thank you very much!!
Aw, thank you so much! I hope you like all the videos ;D
Water is so cool... it's effectively incompressible, there are at least 21 types of ice, Ice-I(sub-n), Ice-I(sub-c) all the way to Ice-XIX, and a newer one called "square ice", all of which form under different conditions. Ice-VII is what's likely at the bottom of a couple moons oceans.
Always enjoys your work.
I know right! The first time I learned about all the different ice polymorphs I was so impressed :D It's such a one of a kind liquid (& solid) lol!
And thanks, glad you enjoyed it ;)
This made me think of Kurt Vonnegut's famous novel "Cat's Cradle", where a scientist figures how to make ice crystals that are stable over zero degrees at Earth's normal surface pressure conditions. Of course, everyone dies. 😅 In the novel, the hypothetical ice polymorph is called Ice-Nine.
21 types⁉️
I think I only learned about there being 7 in the last year.
This is going to be a great video I just know it! I ❤ GEO GIRL
Utterly fascinating video! I've just discovered your channel and subscribed immediately. Perhaps unusually, I recently got interested in (terrestrial) geology through it's 'exo' variant. As a very passionate meteorite collector I (ridiculously) know more of extra-terrestrial rocks than I do about the ones under my feet (as a physicist I don't really have much formal education in geology). I am sure that your videos will help remedy this situation somewhat. If you are interested, I have a very extensive collection of high resolution macro photos of most if not exactly all of the huge variety of meteoritic material. I would love to see, for example, the visual comparison between extra-terrestrial rocks and their closest terrestrial analogues.
Hiiii.... I love these topics but currently don't have time ...but I will definitely watch all of your videos as soon as I get free. They are so good ❤️
Thank you 😊
Thanks! That's so sweet of you to comment even before you have the time to watch the video, thanks for the support and kind words ;)
I’m new here and loving the channel! Not trying to upset the apple cart here but is it possible in the video as you discuss topics to mention verbally or show on the screen citations for good papers which support what we know (or are inferring from the data) on each of the conclusions we have about the icy moons? I’d love to get to know the literature and also the researchers in this field better. Thanks again for putting out such great videos!
Trust me, I am good about this for some videos and so bad about it for others, I'm sorry! I will try to be better about adding the citations right next to the statements ;)
I lost motivation to do this because it seemed when I put them, many people didn't have access, so I just stopped, but you've re-motivated to do this, so I'll try and be better about this, and if people can't access them it's the journal's fault not mine haha!
@@GEOGIRL It's not the journal's fault, it's intended by the probably owner, the infamous Rupert Murdoch. Restricting access to science and education is one of his fetishes.
I suggest linking the research articles not in those journals with paywalls but in the open sci-hub managed by the hero Alexandra Elbakyan.
Based on your recommendation I picked up a copy of the “Alien Oceans” book and I’m loving it! Since that book was written a couple years ago the spectra debate still seemed quite open. Any idea on if JWST is being used to get better error bars on the spectra for Iogenic sulphur versus the indigenous salts?
Ooo that's a great question! I am not sure, but I will look into what JWST is looking at for those moons. However, my guess is even though JWST is AWESOME, it is still way further away than Voyager, Galileo, and Cassini were when they were in the outer solar system, so I doubt that we will get more precise data from JWST. The only thing that will give us that is Clipper and other missions that plan to go to the Jovian system.
@@GEOGIRL JUNO data may help to a small extent with Europe a bit as well. It's not designed to do that, but it's amazing what repurposing NASA engineers have been able to do with their spacecraft.
al those different fields of science come together, the amazing power of the human mind and working together. serious... i love science. thanks for sharing the knowledge geo girl!
Agreed! I love the way the sciences overlap in planetary science ;D
Wow! You must have researched this quite a lot. Your knowledge is very extensive.
NOTE TO NON-MEMBERS OF THIS CHANNEL - Over the past 2 days, Geo Girl has uploaded FOUR (!!!) full videos for channel members to view early. These are all amazingly informative and well researched. (And they're about dinosaurs!) She is super intelligent, she knows her stuff, she does the research and work necessary to make these great videos, and most importantly, she is clearly committed to the long-term success of this channel. So, please subscribe and become a channel member! Geo Girl is awesome!
Haha, you are too sweet Ted, thanks for the shout out ;)
🦕🦖 *DINOSAURS* 🦕🦖
Very interesting. Thanks!
Explained soooo good... I dont get, why u dont have more views :o
Thank you! I hope it will have many more views someday ;)
Very nice video..🙃🙃❤️
Thank you! ;D
@@GEOGIRL most welcome...💖✨✨🙃🙃
Thanks, this is probably the best video on Europa's ice dynamics that I've seen. Great explanations. I still think there is no life native to Europa, due to initial conditions not being very favourable to biogenesis (too cold in general, even around potential "smokers", and organic molecules not concentrated enough). But I'm moderately confident that Earth-originated life might be able to survive there if we were to bring it.
Yea, I think there is some worry about transferring something from Earth to Europa and that's one of the reasons that we have a hard time justifying a lander over a flyby. But the good news is it's way harder to do so on an outer solar system mission compared to an inner solar system because the chances of anything surviving that trip go way down :)
@@GEOGIRL Super interesting topic. I would suspect that your usual bacterial wouldn't care very well even after reaching destination. Anything that is not anaerobic, and an extremophile, would just stand on Europa's ice, inert, waiting to be recycled.
Now, we can find potential Earth analogs for 3 possible biomes on and under the surface of Europa. But maybe we should look at conditions before the GOE to be totally fair.
We have to look at conditions that never really existed on Earth, though. An Earth with low ocean temperatures, low oxygen, and high concentration in ocean iron (among other dissolved minerals). This would be a hybrid of pre-GOE Suderian chemistry coupled with Hutonian global temperatures. I don't think there was ever a slushball Earth prior to the GOE and iron precipitation. No surface life, no rocks of biological origin (chalk, etc), no white sands, and surface weathering brings pretty much anything into the ocean. Non oxygenated, high ions seawater must have had a peculiar color, possibly dirty and opaque.
What biomes do we have? 1. Cold, high salinity, high dissolved ions seawater with iron, sulfur, etc. 2. Warm seawater near hot spots (smokers), with lower saturation point. 3. Surface ice and snow, partially or totally exposed to solar radiation.
On Earth, prokaryotes living in surface ice and snow are rather interesting. Glaciers in Antarctica for instance. They live in water that is not from the sea but from surface weather (precipitation). Where do they get their carbon, where do they get their phosphorus? Volcanic ashes and atmospheric CO2. Even in an atmosphere without oxygen, if there is volcanism there is ash. So, ice is not completely barren.
Life near black and white smokers has been studied a lot. Extremophiles who like heat and elements such as sulfur and iron.
Life in cold brine, I haven't read enough to know the fine details. I'd say cold halophiles would be a very interesting research subject.
(I'm also interested in the chemical contribution of volcanic ash on organisms living in surface ice.)
This is not looking good for Mars, thinking of it. It's a dead world, very dry on the surface, with no liquid water anywhere, no volcanism and no internal heat source. The only thing it has going is surface iron oxide and moderate solar radiation. Not very friendly to life, zero biome out of three.
Europa doesn't have an atmosphere, no surface volcanism, but has internal heat. This we can consider the brine seawater biome, as well as the deepwater smokers.
In your opinion, what Earth extremophiles exactly would be "interested" in a Europa vacation? Sulfur eating, iron eating, cold halophiles? Other types? Have we detected phosphorus in Europa ice "streaks"?
Please note that I am not an expert, just interested in the topic. Thanks.
What is the basis for the low organic molecules concentration assumption? I would possibly expect the opposite. From carbonaceous chondrite meteorites we know that the early outer Solar system material (including vicinity of Jupiter and beyond), compared to the inner rocky planet material, was actually extremely rich in wide variety of organic chemicals including amino acids and nucleobases. So "raw materials" for life should have been even more readily available on Europe compared to Earth.
From the lowest staging site in Europa's ice, we are just above the surface of the water, preparing a mission into the depths.
There is evidence of a mollusk like higher life form similar to that of a cephalopod.
The water is roiling, (eerie music plays in the background)
In a whispering voice.... "Let's get out of here?"
It's amazing how soon we'll have a Europa spaceprobe to Europa - like in a couple of years! And! it has a submarine thing that they are hoping to to get under all that ice and have a look around!
There's a live webcam of them building this Europa probe. It's usually pretty boring. i'm there for maybe thirty seconds!
Hi , Hope you are doing great i just want some answers regarding phd from USA Universities like what is minimum qualification, does they provide accommodation, does they provide stipend to non American phd students , what is the criteria for selection of phd in Top universities like what should we do to get into it and please also make one video on your daily routine like how a phd student spend there day we will love it Thank you 👍
I am doing great thanks! I will try to answer your questions, but just be aware my answers are based on my experience and may be missing information that other US universities use.
1. I know that the minimum qualification depends on which University, but for the most part as long as you have your Bachelors you qualify.
2. If by 'accomodation' you mean housing, not in my experience. For the most part you have to find and pay your own living costs (however, the living costs are typically covered by your salary or stipend if you are a TA or RA, see below).
3. Yes, they pretty much all provide a stipend or salary if you are on an assistantship (this means, you are a phd student, but also an employee of the university either as a research assistant, RA, or a teaching assistant, TA). Most of the time, the payment will cover both tuition and living. But sometimes, it doesn't cover both, so keep an eye on that. As for non American students, in my experience (at UTEP, which has a lot of students from Mexico), they are also paid the same as American students if they are either a RA or TA. And sometimes, they can even find additional scholarship money from funding opportunities that are specifically targeting minority groups, so keep an eye out for those as well.
4. The criteria for selection includes: your grades (past transcripts), your application (the essays you wrote for your application), your recommendation letters (both who they are from and what they say, make sure the people you get to write a recommendation really know you well), your previous awards and honors, but most importantly previous research experience. In my experience, having done undergraduate research was my biggest selling point, they like that a lot because a student that has never done any research before is a bit of a wild card for them and they'd rather go with a student they can trust with research.
5. Okay, so this wasn't one of your questions, but I also just want to say a BIG thing you need to do when applying to PhD programs is contact the professor that you want to work with. You will need an advisor in grad school and if you contact them ahead of time (even before you apply), it makes the process so much easier and also makes the school want you more because if they have a professor that wants you they will accept you with no hesitation. For example, I contacted 10 different professors from 10 different universities before I applied. Then after getting to know the professors over email a bit and see if they even had any openings for a phd student, I applied and then eventually picked one and had to call the rest to tell them I wouldn't be going there, but trust me having to tell them no is way more fun than you being told no, so contact professors ahead of time, that is my best advice ;)
@@GEOGIRL Thanks a lot unlike other youtubers you give value to your subscribers I am your subscriber since you have around 1.5 k subscriber but even after having 10 k subscriber you still reply to every comment and that is great thing I didn't get one thing I know about research Assistance but if you are a phd student aren't you already a research assistant aren't all PhDs are automatically research assistant??
@@mi4208 Not necessarily. I mean you are technically an unpaid research assistant, correct, but being funded by a research assistantship position is different. For example, some of my semesters they've paid me as a research assistant if my advisor has enough grant money because then I can focus all my energy on my research. Whereas, other semesters, they pay me as a teaching assistant when my advisor doesn't have enough grant money to fund me as a research assistant. As a teaching assistant, I still have to work on my own research, but I also have to teach and technically I am only being paid to teach during those semesters. I hope that makes sense.
Also, thank you for the kind words and for following me for so long
I’ve been waiting for probes to find life in Europa for decades. I’m running out of time here. I’m eager to see what the Europa Clipper mission will find when it launches in a couple of years. Fingers crossed I’ll last the decade to see the results. :)
You make geology cool, you 'rock'GG ❤️🇿🇦
Aw thank you so much! :D
Happy to find out that Europa is consuming Io.
Is it possible the surface layers are absorbing the salts, creating a vast body of pure water below? As if the salts and other components are attracted to the already collected material topside. Just a thought of imagination.
I have no idea, but that's an interesting thought! My hunch is probably not... just because ice that freezes from salt water is always more fresh than the water because that's the only way it would be stable. But I am only speaking in terms of Earth conditions, so on europa, who knows! ;D
Please upload vedio on how Andes mountain form
I LOOOVE the t shirt. You should make a Geo Girl one!
I've thought about eventually selling merch, but I figured no one would want a shirt that says Geo Girl haha, please let me know if I am wrong about that ;) My other thought was to sell merch with certain science related or nerdy sayings, but I don't think I have any catch phrases yet on my channel. Maybe I'll just wait and see ;)
I heard Callisto also has a subsurface ocean. Do you have any info on that?
Yes, but unfortunately I think most of the models suggest that Callisto's ocean is sandwiched by ice, and without water-rock interactions, there would not be a good chance of life there :( But who knows, maybe the rocks find a way to come into contact with the water!
Just a thought I had while binge-watching the planetary geology series on Europa:
If the dark markings in the cracks and fissures of europa's ice crust are the result of salts coming out of solution as water escapes and evaporates ( or freezes out and snows down on another part of the surface), wouldn't that mean any sub surface ocean would be hypersaline? The salty ice would eventually be subducted back down to the subsurface ocean, but any water that made it to the surface would be gone forever.
Hi geogirl! Could you make a video talking about alkaline rocks please?
Sure, any particular rock types in mind, or just all alkaline rocks? And any particular topic in mind (e.g., their formation, their depositional environments, sedimentary alkaline rocks, igneous ones, etc.)? :)
@@GEOGIRL all igneous alkaline rocks please!
Europa has Space Whales :)
The thing that really interests me is the possibility of both vulcanism and cry-volcanism. Fifteen percent of IO's surface is covered with volcanoes compared to the 29% of earths surface that is covered by land . . . If the interior oceans of Europa and Ganymede follow a similar pattern on their hidden surface that would create a very unique set of environments with quite a lot of power for heat based or methan/sufur based chemosynthesis.
This is complete speculation but I'd picture a very rough interior surface filled with "black smokers" that send chemicals up into strong currents powered by the different water temperatures, and eventually many of those chemicals being sprayed onto the bottom surface of the outer ice shell. I'd love to see what that looks like . . . how do you have waves or distribute thermal energy in a completely enclosed ocean where you can't have tsunamis, rogue waves, and hurricanes? What is the weather like? Do you have ices melting, condensing and then falling like rain?
I feel life is likely, there probably are basalts down there that could form RNA but . . . That's almost a bonus when we are looking at a set of conditions this exotic. There is so much to learn there.
cant wait for arrival of europa clipper
I want us to explore here the most out of any other place. With ROV mission's, upgraded data transfer tech ability. Etc. I'm so facinated with geologically diverse and complex systems, like Pluto, Io, Ganymede, Enceladus, Titan. Anything is more interesting & better than Mars. I'm so tired and bored of Mars lol sorry not sorry. I just want to see what scientific discoveries we could find in other places in our solar system. Plus we've put so much time in to Mars and hardly anything has come from it. (Except for maybe learning we need to figure out how to make better ROV devices for missions idk?) Just joking around but I really wish things could go faster, I'm so curious and I'd love to see some things occur during my lifetime... But sadly I know things take a lot of time and trial and error process... Darn it.
Absolutely fascinating! Just the fact that liquid water can exist so far from the Sun, is staggering.
From a dummy's standpoint... wouldn't the water HAVE to be highly saline, to remain liquid in those low temperatures?
You've excited my Curiosity, Rachel!! 😊
... I will laugh, if we finally find complex extraterrestrial life - and they're little green men!! 🤣😂
Well the heating of the Earth may be primarily from solar radiation, but on moons like Europa, heating comes primarily from tidal stree rather than solar radiation. Tidal stress is from the gravitational pull of Jupiter (and other moons) on Europa which stretches and strains it so much that it provides enough heat to maintain a liquid water ocean :) Tidal heat is also why Io is so volcanically active!
@@GEOGIRL A-ha! Of course. Thank you! 😊
Could that red stuff on the surface of Europa ice be "blood ice"? (bacteria)
I sure hope so! But I'd be spectical given the lack of atmosphere on Europa, and the spectral signatures of the colored regions which indicate salt... But who knows, anything is possible ;D
Hii.. geo girl..🤩😃😃how are you?
Doing great, how are you? :)
@@GEOGIRL very well...😃🙃🙃✨
Greetings from the BIG SKY.
Non-ice is exciting, but that room is not. We could send you some posters, or like a Mars globe or something? You deserve it, you have 10.9k subscribers. You shouldn't be the only thing lighting that space up.
Haha! Trust me, I've wanted to spice up my room for my videos for a while now, but unfortunately the window, which is my lighting, faces the wall with the doors, so nothing is hanging there. I've always wanted to have a rock display in the back of my videos but don't have one in this apartment (it's back in my old room at my parents house until I find it a more permanent home). But I am open to suggestions of how to make my current background more exciting. I don't have any other options on location right now because I have a roommate, but I'll be moving in January so maybe my new place will have more potential :)
Interesting speculations based on limited data. We will not really know what Europa's ocean chemistry actually is until unmanned probes are sent.
Hi, Geo girl
Would this be Eurology?
Hahaha I guess it would ;)
Please all the Europa info plz.
Of course ;D
When you said: "don't go assuming that aliens are green humanoid"... I was like: of course not, in Europa they must be like cod and sardine, shark and squid... and then I happily went on imagining the complicated fishing industry of the future: how the EuroCod[TM] was perfectly salted and frozen (both for good measure) because everything is so cold that it has no problem until you have to resend it from substation Moon to Earth, that's tricky, as happens with all outre space economic supply opperations, that's why Musk lost all his money (in the future of course): his gold, and platinum and lithium, mithrill and unbelievium mined in the asteroids was never licensed to land on Earth because of the Gravity Catastrophe Prevention Law, so he had to sell it as jewelry to Moon tourists at a loss.
Anyway, then I got asleep (video was over by then, worry not) and then I got up and re-listened to that fragment and you said something about microbial. At first I was a bit frustrated but then I realized that would solve the Gravity Catastrophe Prevention Law conundrum, as the microbial fish would be under the threshold of the law, you can dump them on Earth's atmosphere one by one or even 10 by 10... it's less clear when how or where they fall but cooking time should be enough.
🤣
Is their phosphorus?
If there are (or ever were) water-rock interactions then yes :D
When to go there?
Europa Clipper will be getting there in 2030!
@@GEOGIRL will it get to the ocean?
@@imneverwrongsometimestruthlies Unfortunately no, but like I mentioned in this video, there's a lot we could learn about the ocean from the ice and plumes at the surface :D
The Turing Test video game takes place on Europa. That all I know about Europa.
You are incredible and beautiful😍
Thank you so much!
What if we don't find life there? Even microbial? What could be the harm in introducing life to Europa environment and running some experiments? Would they then be called Europeans? Would we have to supply them with croissants and baguettes?
BTW, I agree with Girish Kumar Verma...
Haha Thank you. And I think that we take so many precausions when it comes to preventing transmission, I'm not at all worried that that would be an issue, especially because we aren't sending a lander to Europa any time soon. But even if we do, I think we will manage to keep things abiotic. I think that if we don't find life on Europa, that is just amazing a discovery as if we do. BUT only if we prove that there is none. It's unfortunately almost impossible to prove that there is no life on a planet or moon because you'd have to search every inch, and then there's always the possiblity that you are search with equipment that cannot detect a different kind of life than ours. So I doubt we will every be able to say "there is no life on Europa".
I love the analogy of taking a bucket of ocean water from Earth''s ocean and looking in it. There is no life, no fish, no nothing (at least to the naked eye), but that's because we just took one little bucket when there is a whole ocean full of life out there.
So I think we will always just keep searching :)
Europa's Subnautica marine mega fauna!
We can only hope! :D
❤
As someone who really only feels comfortable learning from their bedroom, thank you.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed it! I am the same way ;D
We've got to send a probe under that ice.
I’m betting we find Nessie
As for youtubers confusing organic material with biogenic: I relatively recently unsubscribed a channel that confused this. It makes me think the channel is a desinforming one.
Noted: Aliens on Europa are not green humanoids
Hahaha thank you for noting that ;)
ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE
Unless we find a monolith is is all green.
You looking beautiful..🙃🙃
Thanks ;)
@@GEOGIRL most welcome..🙂🙂😇
Water
We dont and we dont. Lights in the sky. Nothing more.
GC, Call Me Old Fashioned but Surely We Should Send a Mission to Europa and Drill ??.
Drill Down Get some Cores Bring back to Earth or Space Base on Mars and Study.
Get More Certainty.
The Monty Python crew have made a movie that might be of assistance to you. It is called the Life of Brine.
That's terrible! Lol.
Niiiiiiiiii !
I asked this question on an old video but, being afraid you don't look at old comments, I decided to ask again. I've had this question for at least 30 years.
WHY DOES MENSTRUATION MATCH THE MOON? Obviously, it not just about women because many mammals have 28 day cycles. I know its old. I know it happened when we were influenced by ocean movements. But where is the benefits? Please answer me someone. Make a video?
Perhaps it evokes embarrassment. Please be above it.
In my youth I was embarrassed when it was pointed out how often men think of sex. Now I realize we wouldn't be here without it so 40 years after being embarrassed I am now proud that I think of it so often. lol
Probably spawning in estuaries, which is inherently a tidal event.
To make sure all us reproductively compatible inner fishies showed up to the orgy on the same tide, evolution probably used lunar light signals to set a circadian type biological clock. Different species may have used low light new moon spawning tides, while others high light full moon tides, but likely the biochemical clock was the same.
Interestingly, ancestral tetrapods seem to have had a 3rd light sensing "eye" on the top of the skull. Hard core modern throwbacks like the tuatara still have a functioning one.
Most of us modern terrestrial tetrapods just kept the pineal gland clock and bone plastered over the optical window.....
@@NullHand Thank you for this reply. In a former video I asked the same question. She said that there was nothing causal. I did some research and proved the relationship from a resent study and mentioned it to her.
After more research I learned that it wasn't as old as I thought. As it turns out the hypothalamus in our brain dictates the pattern. It is hooked into our biological clock as you mentioned. WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN FOR 30 YEARS. LOL
This year marks my 43 archery season. I know how the shorter days start the release of hormones which start a deer's reproductive phase (as it does in plants and other things.)
I see so many things that reflect our relationship with the oceans (from waves eliminating stress to fish food being good for us, being the only ape who can float, and many others).
Thanks again. btw how did you know all of this?
Aren't you people tired of lying 24/7?
They dont believe they are lying.
@@ThatCasualZach yeah they 'honor their god'..
Lying about what exactly? Nothing presented here is more than optimistic extrapolation. Make your case plainly, if you plan to argue one.
@@michaelcox1071 tell us more
More cartoons for the atheists.
I am actually not an atheist myself ;)
Something I can never wrap my head around is how much material is lost through Geysers/Plumes (Enceladus as well)? Is material deposited back onto the surface, but there is an important non-zero depletion of resources which is lost to space, Io, Jupiter. What percentage of the total amount of water is lost over a billion years?
Well I read that even though Io's mass loss rate is about ~2,200 lbs (1000 kg) per second, that comes out to only about 0.3% of it's total mass in it's lifetime (~4.5 billion years, assuming it formed when all the other planets/moons did). So it seems like a lot but really over time it doesn't account for much when put in relative terms to how big these moons are (of course, they seem small compared to Jupiter, but again it's all relative haha).
I think for Enceladus, and especially Europa, the amount lost is much less. I think I read about 200kg/sec for Enceladus. But since it is much smaller, that would account for 30% of it's initial mass if it had been going on for 4.5 billion years. However, Enceladus and Europa's plumes may only be intermittent meaning not always emitting material, so it's hard to know for these moons how much they've lost, but since they started out as mostly water and still are, it would be hard for them to loose all their water like Io has.
Anyway, hope that answers your question :)
@@GEOGIRL It absolutely does, and more! Thank you!
For all of those we really don't know yet moments, I'm looking forward to your videos in late 2024 / early 2025, when we get the probe data back and can fill in a lot of these blanks for us. 🛰️🤓 🛰️
I know right, can you imagine what we might know just one decade from now?! :D