Search for life signal on Titan

This is an interesting development, does Huygens have an instrument on board to detect life? apparently so (if it exists).

news.bbc.co.uk...

"Scientists will comb data sent back from Titan by the Huygens probe for the chemical signature of life in a bid to identify the moon's source of methane."

I was'nt even aware that this was a mission objective.

I don't remember this ever being mentioned before.......

"There is no chance for life on the surface because it is too cold and there is no liquid water.

"However, models of Titan's interior show there should be an ocean about 100km deep at around 300km below the surface."

A liquid water ocean? that's news to me and notice they say "should exist" not might exist, how could they know this?

exciting news...
I was wondering about the methane thing... when we went to mars, they were saying that methane would be proof of organic life... so why would titan be different...
well the story covers why... and how... but is looking for if...

When the first picture came thru, and showed the rounded "rocks" the first thing i noticed was a "broken rock" split exactly down the middle but NOT ALL THE WAY THRU...
I thought..." that looks just like a desert plant that i have seen"... it is a plant that looks just like a green rock... rounded the same way... and when they "breed" they split the exact same way... they start off like a cell dividing and eventually totally split... It looked like a slightly larger (later measured) version of what we have here...
What is to say that it is'nt a similiar plant that uses an antifreeze type fluid instead of water for liquid cycle functions? if the planet seems just like an earth that is offset by hundreds of degrees of temperature, then maybe there is all the things it needs in the life cycle, but offset to use other elements for life?

That's news to me too! I doubt that life exists on Titan because of the conditions there. But I'm applying terrestrial standards of life to extraterrestrials. And life has a way of surprising us. Who knows? But it's awfully exciting to consider!

Originally posted by LazarusTheLong
I was wondering about the methane thing... when we went to mars, they were saying that methane would be proof of organic life... so why would titan be different...

Methane is common in outer solar system.
It's because temperature is there right so that carbon and hydrogen can stay together. Also water ice is common building material of moons in there, but much rarer in inner solar system.

Here in earth carbon is mostly absorbed in rocks and hydrogen has merged with oxygen forming water.

www.bbc.co.uk...

fish in the arctic ocean contain a form of natural antifreeze. Anything is possible.

I don't think the probe is actually looking for life, per se, but just the sort of requirements we think have to exist in order for there to be life.

The reason it is so interesting to them is the fact that the methane supply keeps replinishing. If you look at the aerial photograph you can see the methane rivers and lakes. Methane is given off mostly as a waste product of living things.

The atmosphere of titan and the sunlight going thru it break down the methane but more is produced by some process on the planet. I belive there is life there. It is a moon with a very thick atmosphere. Sure it's cold but cold can be overcame easier than boiling heat as in the inner planets. The outer planets are gas and pluto is basically an asteroid.

So really it's one of the few places with an atmosphere in our solar system. And it seems life is something that will exist even under the most extreme conditions.

Heres a few links to bacteria found living in extreme conditions.
The bacteria that survived 2 1/2 years on the moon.
www.panspermia.org...

Bacteria that live in frozen methane deposits under the ocean under extreme pressure.
www.science.psu.edu...


I think the life there is of some kind that eats some sort of petroleum on the surface and then produces methane from it. Think of the animals that live in the boiling ocean vents and live off the chemical soup. This is less extreme than that.

i can't figure why people think life cannot exist in conditions we cannot exist...there could be a happy little culture of saturnlings or neptunites flourishing on those planets...how the f do we know how other life exists...thats if there is other life at all

IntelRetard,
Interesting you say that about the fish. Many spiders are known to produce glycerol as a biological antifreeze. Here are a couple of links:

www1.gantep.edu.tr...

www.gi.alaska.edu...

www.americanarachnology.org...

www.zoo.utoronto.ca...