“This is an incredible discovery,” said Christopher Glein of the Southwest Research Institute, one of the paper’s co-authors. “We found an abundance of phosphorus in samples of the icy grains from plumes sprouting from a suspected subsurface ocean (The moon spews very fine ice particles into space with which the iconic rings around Saturn are built, ed.).”
Scientists had previously discovered minerals and organic compounds in the ice particles emitted by the moon, but not yet phosphorus, a substance essential for life. Thanks to phosphorus, we can store energy in our body and the substance also forms the basis of our DNA. In other words, life as we know it would not be possible without phosphorus.
“This is the first time we’ve discovered this essential element in an ocean that isn’t on Earth,” added Frank Postberg, the study’s lead author and planetary scientist at Freie Universitat. “With this discovery, we now know that the ocean of Enceladus meets the basic conditions necessary for life,” said Christopher Glein. “The next step is clear: we need to return to Enceladus to see if the habitable ocean is actually inhabited.”
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