Scientists detect building block for life on Saturn's moon Enceladus - Mashable
"We found evidence that one of the key elements that's needed for life on Earth should be present in high abundance in the ocean of Enceladus," Christopher Glein, a senior scientist at the Southwest Research Institute, a research and development organization, told Mashable.And previous research concluded there wasn't much phosphorus in Enceladus' seas, which doesn't bode as well for the ocean world's habitability.
This latest research, however, used updated, more detailed computer simulations of how Enceladus' rocky seafloor geology interacts with the salty seas, a natural process that dissolves phosphorus minerals into the water."We don’t know exactly what the rocky core of Enceladus is made of, but we can make good guesses based on what we find in other places in the solar system," Geoff Collins, a planetary scientist at Wheaton College who had no role in the research, told Mashable.