NASA makes exciting discoveries about the universe and nearby planets on a regular basis, but the past few months have produced a particularly steady stream of really awesome news about exoplanets, the history of Mars, and the possibility of life outside of Earth. Now, NASA wants to talk about water. More specifically, the agency is planning a news conference for Thursday, April 13th, to reveal “new results about ocean worlds,” and if you’re one of the many who is waiting for the day where humanity discovers evidence of living creatures not from our planet, you should be paying attention.
NASA will be using the event to talk about new discoveries made by the Cassini spacecraft as well as the always reliable Hubble Space Telescope. “These new discoveries will help inform future ocean world exploration,” NASA says in its press release announcing the upcoming event, adding that the scientist panel will also talk more about the anticipated Europa Clipper mission which will send hardware to Jupiter’s frozen moon.
Ocean worlds are particularly interesting to astronomers searching for life outside of Earth because the presence of ice and water is a great indicator that a planet can support, or perhaps once supported, some form of life. That makes lots of sense, since life on Earth is thought to have originated in the ocean before evolution pushed it onto land and eventually into the skies.
The conference is set to take place on Thursday, April 13th, at 2 pm EDT, and will be streamed live on both the NASA TV website and its YouTube channel.
