Rosetta mission finds oxygen on comet 67P

[webfact]

Rosetta mission finds oxygen on comet 67P

The rubber duck-shaped comet named 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is yielding more and more surprises

BRUSSELS: -- Scientists have now found oxygen in its hazy halo, a discovery that could change our understanding of how the solar system formed.

The findings, which baffled the Rosetta team, were published in the journal Nature.

Oxygen is common on Earth, but not elsewhere in the universe. Scientists had certainly never found it on a comet before. What also surprised them was how much there was.

A decade ago, Rosetta the spacecraft and Philae the robot set out to catch comet 67P. Last year, Rosetta dropped Philae onto its surface to study it more closely. The tools on Rosetta already found earlier this year that the comet had its own kind of water.

Comets are of huge interest to scientists because, to human knowledge, they are the most ancient bodies of the solar system – the building blocks from which our sun and planets were formed some 5 billion years ago.




-- (c) Copyright Euronews 2015-10-29

[sirineou]

Oxygen is common on Earth, but not elsewhere in the universe.

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe, according to the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility.

[SheungWan]

An amazing journey.

[FangFerang]

Oxygen is common on Earth, but not elsewhere in the universe.

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe, according to the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility.

I did some work at TJNAF, and it was a shame they shut it down. Maybe they restarted it?

[otherstuff1957]

Oxygen is common on Earth, but not elsewhere in the universe.

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe, according to the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility.

Oxygen is indeed very common. It is also very reactive and will easily combine with a large variety of other substances under a wide variety of conditions. The only reason we have free oxygen in our atmosphere and dissolved in our oceans is that plant life on Earth is constantly breaking down carbon dioxide and H20 reforming them into oxygen and starches.

On all other planets, the oxygen is combined with carbon (CO2) or hydrogen (H20 or H2O2) or iron (FexOx) or other elements. Aside from photosynthesis, there are very few reactions that will form free oxygen. So, the presence of free oxygen is either a indicator of possible extraterrestrial life or a previously unknown chemical reaction. Either way, scientists will be quite excited about this.

[sirineou]

Oxygen is common on Earth, but not elsewhere in the universe.

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe, according to the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility.

Oxygen is indeed very common. It is also very reactive and will easily combine with a large variety of other substances under a wide variety of conditions. The only reason we have free oxygen in our atmosphere and dissolved in our oceans is that plant life on Earth is constantly breaking down carbon dioxide and H20 reforming them into oxygen and starches.

On all other planets, the oxygen is combined with carbon (CO2) or hydrogen (H20 or H2O2) or iron (FexOx) or other elements. Aside from photosynthesis, there are very few reactions that will form free oxygen. So, the presence of free oxygen is either a indicator of possible extraterrestrial life or a previously unknown chemical reaction. Either way, scientists will be quite excited about this.

How about electrolysis, would it not separate oxygen and hydrogen from water? and aren't comets made mostly of frozen water

"A comet is a body in the solar system that orbits the Sun. It consists of a nucleus that is perhaps made of rock, dust, and ice, and may exhibits a coma (atmosphere, with associated ionosphere, magnetosphere, sometimes called a plasmasphere), and/or one or more tails: an ion tail (or plasma tail) and dust tail.

In the plasma of the solar wind, and due to the photoelectric effect, the comet nucleus may charge electrostatically, and the ions and dust in the ionosphere and tails produce their own magnetic and electric fields, and electric currents."

http://www.plasma-universe.com/Comet

Could't such electric currents create an electrolytic affect releasing oxygen from the frozen water.

I would look for the corresponding amount of Hydrogen

Edited October 30, 2015 by sirineou

[sirineou]

additional question,

the photosynthetic process required for the production of dioxygen, does it have to be organic or is there an other way to achieve photosynthesis?