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Hydrothermal vents on seafloors of ‘ocean worlds’ could support life, new study says
Many lines of research suggest that some ocean worlds release enough heat internally to drive hydrothermal circulation under their seafloors. This heat is generated by radioactive decay, as occurs deep in the Earth, with additional heat possibly generated by tides.
Now, a new study by UC Santa Cruz researchers suggests that lower-temperature vents, which are common across Earth's seafloor, may help to create life-supporting conditions on "ocean worlds" in our solar system. In Earth's solar system, several of Jupiter's and Saturn's moons are ocean worlds, and their existence has motivated everything from peer-reviewed academic studies and spacecraft missions with satellites, to popular movies like the 2013 sci-fi thriller, The Europa Report. The seawater-circulation system that the team based their computer models on was found on a 3.5 million-year-old seafloor in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, east of the Juan de Fuca Ridge.
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