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Electricity Found on Saturn Moon—Could It Spark Life?
from National Geographic News
Recently identified electrical activity on Saturn's largest moon bolsters arguments that Titan is the kind of place that could harbor life. At a brisk -350 degrees Fahrenheit (-180 Celsius), Titan is currently much too cold to host anything close to life as we know it, scientists say.
But a new study reports faint signs of a natural electric field in Titan's thick cloud cover that are similar to the energy radiated by lightning on Earth. Lightning is thought to have sparked the chemical reactions that led to the origin of life on our planet.
"As of now, lightning activity has not been observed in Titan's atmosphere," said lead author Juan Antonio Morente of the University of Granada in Spain. But, he said, the signals that have been detected "are an irrefutable proof for the existence of electric activity."
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