At first glance, Saturn’s moon Titan doesn’t seem like the kind of place that could host alien life. The average temperature of this distant orange ball is a frigid -290 degrees Fahrenheit.
And while Titan is the only other place in the solar system where we know there are flowing liquids on the surface, its lakes, rivers, and seas are filled with methane and ethane (too toxic for any Earthly lifeforms to survive in). Any water on the planet would be frozen solid.
But what if there were a different form of life? What if there were one that didn’t need water to survive — something we’ve never seen here on Earth.
According to a new study by scientists at Cornell University, there’s a chance that life actually could exist on this distant moon.
That’s because when sunlight hits Titan’s toxic yellow atmosphere, it produces hydrogen cyanide (HCN) — a molecule that researchers believe was vital in pre-life, or prebiotic reactions that led to life on our own planet.
HCN reacts to form large molecules called polymers, including polyimine. And polyimine is able to absorb a wide spectrum of light – “so wide that it's enough to capture light penetrating Titan's dense and hazy atmosphere,” making it a possible catalyst for life, reports Science Alert.
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