Two years ago here at TED I reported that we had discovered at Saturn, with the Cassini Spacecraft, an anomalously warm and geologically active region at the southern tip of the small Saturnine moon Enceladus, seen here. This region seen here for the first time in the Cassini image taken in 2005. This is the south polar region, with the famous tiger-stripe fractures crossing the south pole. And seen just recently in late 2008, here is that region again, now half in darkness because the southern hemisphere is experiencing the onset of August and eventually winter.
Pred dvema letoma sem tukaj na TED poročala, da smo pri Saturnu z vesoljskim plovilom Cassini odkrili nenavadno toplo in geološko aktivno področje na južnem koncu majhne Saturnove lune Enceladus, ki jo vidimo tukaj. To področje je tukaj prvič vidno na fotografiji, ki jo je Cassini posnel leta 2005. To je južno polarno območje. S slavnimi razpokami v obliki tigrovih prog, ki prečijo južni pol. In kot smo videli ravno pred kratkim, konec 2008, je tu ponovno to področje, sedaj na pol v temi, ker bo na južni polobli nastopil avgust, ki mu bo sledila zima.
And I also reported that we'd made this mind-blowing discovery -- this once-in-a-lifetime discovery of towering jets erupting from those fractures at the south pole, consisting of tiny water ice crystals accompanied by water vapor and simple organic compounds like carbon dioxide and methane. And at that time two years ago I mentioned that we were speculating that these jets might in fact be geysers, and erupting from pockets or chambers of liquid water underneath the surface, but we weren't really sure. However, the implications of those results -- of a possible environment within this moon that could support prebiotic chemistry, and perhaps life itself -- were so exciting that, in the intervening two years, we have focused more on Enceladus.
Poročala sem tudi, da smo prišli do osupljivega odkritja -- tega enkrat-v-življenju odkritja vzpenjajočih se curkov, ki so izbruhnili iz tistih razpok na južnem polu in sestojijo iz majcenih vodnih ledenih kristalov, ki jih spremljajo vodni hlapi in preproste organske spojine, kot sta ogljikov dioksid in metan. In takrat, pred dvema letoma, sem omenila, da domnevamo, da so ti curki morda v resnici gejzirji, ki bruhajo iz žepov ali komor tekoče vode pod površjem. Vendar nismo bili prepričani. Vendar pa so nakazovanja teh rezultatov na možnost okolja znotraj te lune, ki bi lahko omogočalo prebiotično kemijo in mogoče življenje sámo, bila tako razburljiva, da smo se v vmesnih dveh letih bolj osredotočili na Enceladus.
We've flown the Cassini Spacecraft by this moon now several times, flying closer and deeper into these jets, into the denser regions of these jets, so that now we have come away with some very precise compositional measurements. And we have found that the organic compounds coming from this moon are in fact more complex than we previously reported. While they're not amino acids, we're now finding things like propane and benzene, hydrogen cyanide, and formaldehyde. And the tiny water crystals here now look for all the world like they are frozen droplets of salty water, which is a discovery that suggests that not only do the jets come from pockets of liquid water, but that that liquid water is in contact with rock. And that is a circumstance that could supply the chemical energy and the chemical compounds needed to sustain life.
Vesoljsko plovilo Cassini je sedaj že večkrat poletelo mimo te lune. Letelo je bližje in globlje v te curke, v gostejša področja teh curkov, tako da smo zdaj dobili nekaj zelo natančnih meritev sestave. In odkrili smo, da so organske spojine s te lune v resnici bolj kompleksne, kot smo prej poročali. Čeprav niso aminokisline, sedaj odkrivamo stvari, kot so propan in benzen, cianovodikovo kislino in formaldehid. In tile majceni vodni kristali sedaj izgledajo čisto tako, kot da so zmrznjene kapljice slane vode. Kar je odkritje, ki kaže, da ne le, da curki prihajajo iz žepov tekoče vode, temveč, da je tista tekoča voda v stiku s kamnino. In to je okoliščina, ki bi lahko nudila kemično energijo in kemične spojine potrebne za vzdrževanje življenja.
So we are very encouraged by these results. And we are much more confident now than we were two years ago that we might indeed have on this moon, under the south pole, an environment or a zone that is hospitable to living organisms. Whether or not there are living organisms there, of course, is an entirely different matter. And that will have to await the arrival, back at Enceladus, of the spacecrafts, hopefully some time in the near future, specifically equipped to address that particular question. But in the meantime I invite you to imagine the day when we might journey to the Saturnine system, and visit the Enceladus interplanetary geyser park, just because we can.
Ti rezultati so nas zelo opogumili. Sedaj smo veliko bolj prepričani kot pred dvema letoma, da bi na tej luni, pod južnim polom, zares lahko imeli okolje ali predel, ki je prijazen do živih organizmov. Če so ali niso tam živi organizmi, je seveda popolnoma druga stvar. In to bo moralo počakati na prihod vesoljskih plovil nazaj na Enceladus, upamo, da v bližnji prihodnosti, ki bodo opremljena posebej za naslavljanje tega vprašanja. Medtem pa vas vabim, da si predstavljate dan, ko bomo lahko potovali v Saturnov sistem in obiskali medplanetarni park gejzirjev na Enceladusu, samo zato, ker bomo lahko.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(aplavz)