Dave5

I love this… it’s a direct riff on Freeman Dyson’s idea that our SETI work should be looking for freeze dried fish in orbit around these moons.

Since that discovery, mission planners and amateur enthusiasts alike have proposed flying a probe through those plumes to collect samples of those ice grains and bring them back to Earth for study. If successful, such samples could not only prove the existence of a saltwater ocean but may even contain signs of extraterrestrial life.

Now, a team of researchers from the University of California, San Diego, say that the fear of organic samples becoming too damaged during the collection process is unfounded and that NASA or any of the world’s other space agencies could move ahead with plans for a life hunting mission to Enceladus.