Planetary Science Seminar spring-2016

Ocean Worlds from the Inside Out

I will describe possible geochemical drivers for habitability in icy ocean worlds, focusing on Jupiter’s moon Europa. Europa may be special for having high oxidant fluxes to its ocean, coupled with abundant and reliable seafloor reductants. Larger ocean worlds like Ganymede are geophysically intriguing, and may be more astrobiologically compelling than typically thought. I will describe some recent progress in relevant aqueous chemistry and modeling of large ocean worlds that suggests high-pressure ices need not preclude water rock interaction and material transport in deep ocean worlds.