Whenever we look at space and the planets, we look for water. Whether it is in ice form or not, we want to know whether it is present or not. That’s why the idea of the ocean on Uranus’s moon Miranda attracts attention.
Miranda is one of the satellites of Uranus. It could house an ocean of water beneath its surface, a new study reveals. This discovery challenges many assumptions about the history and composition of this moon. And it places it among the few worlds in our solar system with an environment potentially suitable for life.
gigantic ocean
Finding evidence of an ocean inside a small object like Miranda is incredibly surprising. This is pointed out by the planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in the US. He is co-author of the study published in The Planetary Science Journal Tom Nordheim.
Miranda has an approximate radius of 233 km. Its varied surface shows signs of a complex geological history. This moon was photographed during Voyager 2’s flyby in 1986, but experts were only able to analyze its southern hemisphere.
They worked on the study at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. The team of researchers analyzed the surface topography and some other features of Miranda. The data revealed that, between 500 and 100 million years ago, beneath the upper layer of ice, about 30 kilometers thick, in the depths of the satellite there was a huge ocean. Taking into account that its radius is 235 kilometers, the ocean would have filled almost half of the lunar body.
Depth
Furthermore, the study indicates that this underground ocean was at least 100 kilometers deep, writes Phys.org. The most curious thing is that, apparently, this vast sea has not frozen completely until now. If the ocean had frozen, it would have expanded. And, consequently, it would have caused certain cracks on the surface, which do not exist. The ocean on the moon of Uranus makes it a new possibility.
