US space scientists on Thursday unveiled the interplanetary probe NASA plans to send to one of Jupiter’s icy moons as part of humanity’s hunt for extra-terrestrial life.
The Clipper spacecraft is due to blast off in October bound for Europa, one of dozens of moons orbiting the Solar System’s biggest planet, and the nearest spot in our celestial neighborhood that could offer a perch for life.

“One of the fundamental questions that NASA wants to understand is, are we alone in the cosmos?” Bob Pappalardo, the mission’s project scientist told AFP.

“If we were to find the conditions for life, and then someday actually find life in a place like Europa, then that would say in our own solar system there are two examples of life: Earth and Europa.

“That would be huge for understanding how common life might be throughout the universe.”

The $5 billion probe is currently at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, sitting in a “clean room” — a sealed area only accessible to people wearing head-to-toe covering.

The precautions are to ensure the probe remains free of contaminants to avoid transporting Earthly microbes to Europa.

After transport to Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Clipper is set to launch aboard a Space X Falcon Heavy rocket and begin an over-five-year journey that involves a pass by Mars to pick up speed.

In 2031, it should be in orbit around Jupiter and Europa, where it will begin a detailed study of the moon scientists believe is covered in frozen water.

“We have instruments like cameras, and spectrometers, a magnetometer and a radar that can… penetrate right through ice, bounce off liquid water and back to the surface to tell us how thick is the ice and where is liquid water located,” Pappalardo said.

Mission managers do not expect to find little green men swimming in the water — in fact, they’re not even looking for life itself, only for the conditions that could support it.

AAAAARRGGHHHH! GRRRRRR!

The article goes on to say they know conditions on Europa are similar to those deep beneath the earth’s oceans where lifeforms live off of geothermal energy. If this was a video game I’d fire an RPG at those scientists’ office.

Again, I’m hoping the unintended instrument process that could detect life gets it done.

I believe it’s more about long term funding. When Viking failed to detect life on Mars it killed the Mars exploration programs for decades. Since then NASA has been hesitant to do anything that could cut their long term piggy bank. So now the best we can ever do is keep looking over and over again for “the conditions that could support life.”

Annoying AF.

“Remember, it is hard to “look for life” when you are not sure how it can manifest itself, or the environment it is embedded in. Before we can design experiments to look for something, we first need to know just what it is we are looking for, and what the local scene is.”

We know the environment of Europa. We’ve studied it for decades. We can begin by assuming the life will manifest itself in similar ways at the cellular level to life on earth. We could be wrong but that is the baseline we should begin with.

https://www.centauri-dreams.org/

Remember, it is hard to “look for life” when you are not sure how it can manifest itself, or the environment it is embedded in. Before we can design experiments to look for something, we first need to know just what it is we are looking for, and what the local scene is.

Fear not. Nasa has been doing this for a while now, It knows what its doing. And every gram of payload it sends into the outer solar system is done so at great cost, and will yield no result for decades.