In April 2084, three space cities, each carrying a population of 300,000, left one after another with different goals. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 infoIn the near future, more space cities will follow in their footsteps and leave Earth, which has become an irreversible trend.

After a long voyage, the first to reach the destination was Mercury Space City, followed by Jupiter Space City and Saturn Space City.

This time, Yuan Haochen did not travel with any space city, he could only choose to stay on Earth, because there were many important tasks that could not be separated from him.

Although Mercury Space City was the first to arrive at its destination, Yuan Haochen was most concerned about Jupiter Space City. Because, in Hara's plan, the next Jupiter system resource mining and scientific exploration actions are of great significance.

At the IEA headquarters, in the command center of the interstellar migration team, researchers are reporting the latest observations to Yuan Haochen.

"Now, Jupiter is erupting in the largest storm in the solar system this year, covering about twice the diameter of the Earth. The storm is expected to reach a maximum speed of 560 km/h, twice as fast as a Category 5 hurricane (a maximum hurricane of Category 5, or more than 17 on a scale of 17). ”

Yuan Haochen smiled lightly and said, "Then, the residents of Jupiter Space City have a chance to witness a huge Jupiter storm up close. ”

Jupiter is the largest and fastest-rotating planet among the eight planets in the solar system. In the orbit of the solar system, the number from the inside to the outside ranks the fifth. It has a mass 2.5 times the mass of the other seven planets in the solar system combined. Jupiter's surface gravitational acceleration is 23.12 meters per square second, much higher than Earth's. So far, as many as 68 moons of Jupiter have been discovered.

Jupiter is a gas giant. Because gas planets do not have a physical surface, the density of Jupiter's gaseous matter increases with depth. All we can see is the top of the clouds in Jupiter's atmosphere, which is slightly higher than 1 atmosphere.

Jupiter is mainly composed of 84% hydrogen and 14% helium (the ratio of atoms to 75% to 25%) and 2% trace amounts of methane, water, ammonia, etc. Its core temperature is estimated to be as high as 30500C.

"Report to the commander, the second deep space resource development fleet attached to Jupiter Space City has set off for the Jupiter system for resource gathering." The researcher continued to report to Hara.

The second deep space resource development fleet is to collect a large amount of deuterium and helium-3 contained on Jupiter, the sum of their masses accounts for more than 70% of Jupiter's total mass, and Jupiter's mass is about 318 Earth masses, so the sum of the deuterium and helium-3 masses on Jupiter is more than 220 Earth masses.

"If we scrape the earth's crust on the moon, mankind will be able to live a heavenly life, let alone Jupiter!" "However, Jupiter's environmental conditions are too harsh, and it is still difficult for us to use Jupiter's resources. ”

Jupiter's outer layer is an atmosphere dominated by hydrogen, and below it is liquid hydrogen, and the core may be liquid and solid metallic hydrogen (liquid or solid hydrogen becomes a conductor under the high pressure of millions of atmospheres, and is called metallic hydrogen because conductivity is a metal). Jupiter's atmosphere is extremely pressurized, and human science and technology cannot penetrate it at present. Therefore, the plan of the Second Deep Space Resource Development Fleet's operation is only to try to mine deuterium and helium-3 on top of Jupiter's atmosphere.

It is conceivable that if it were not for the impact of the gamma-ray burst crisis, human civilization would definitely choose to establish a resource base and spacecraft base on the periphery of Jupiter if it wanted to develop by leaps and bounds and enjoy a truly high-quality standard of life. Because, in the foreseeable future, the energy consumption of Earth's civilization will be thousands of times that of today, and only Jupiter (and perhaps Saturn) in the entire solar system will be able to meet the huge energy needs of mankind in the future.

However, the Second Deep Space Resource Development Fleet will encounter some difficulties in developing near Jupiter, including strong radiation near Jupiter, strong storms that may occur in Jupiter's atmosphere, and Jupiter's huge gravitational pull.

In addition, the main component of Jupiter's atmosphere is hydrogen, so the slightest oxygen leak can lead to catastrophic consequences, which is why the Second Deep Space Resource Development Fleet should be extra cautious when exploiting Jupiter's resources.

In addition to the exploitation of Jupiter's resources, there is also the scientific exploration of Jupiter's moons.

Among Jupiter's vast family of moons, the most attractive is Europa. Europa's surface temperature is extremely low, there is intense radiation, and it is covered by a sheet of ice thousands of meters thick.

Europa has only an extremely thin atmosphere containing oxygen, and its surface is constantly bombarded with accelerating particles due to Jupiter's strong magnetic field.

When the great scientist Galileo Galilei first observed Europa in 1610 and named it after Europa, the "Mother of Europe" in Greek mythology, he must not have imagined that it was an extraterrestrial world with such a harsh environment.

However, Europa is not a dead world. On the contrary, due to its proximity to Jupiter, Jupiter's enormous gravitational pull causes violent tidal phenomena that cause its rock core to be constantly rubbed and stirred by Jupiter's gravity, and provides it with an astonishing amount of heat enough to turn the lower part of the surface ice sheet into liquid.

So, beneath Europa's deep ice sheet is a vast ocean hundreds of kilometers deep, twice the volume of the Earth's oceans.

Not only that, but Europa's density and temperature reports show that, similar to the situation on Earth, the ocean is directly covered by the lithosphere.

Liquid water, chemical elements – carbon, hydrogen, etc., also has enough energy.

Although Europa's environment is much harsher than Earth's, it is enough to create an ecosystem where microbes can metabolize themselves and synthesize more complex organic molecules.

By all indications, inside Europa, in the abyss of the ocean currents, in the dark world where you can't see your fingers, there is a high probability that countless complex organic matter will be bred.

Someone once imagined that by drilling a hole in Europa's ice cap and lowering the hook, you could catch alien fish.

Such an imagination is indeed too coquettish, but Europa is definitely the most likely place in the entire solar system to have life outside of Earth.

So, is there life in Europa's liquid ocean?

Yuan Haochen believes that if the earth civilization can reveal this mystery before the crisis comes, it can be regarded as a long-standing wish.

If life does exist on Europa, Earth civilization is also willing to help these Earth's closest neighbors, and these weak life forms (the possibility of higher life forms is almost zero) survive the devastating blow that this gamma-ray burst could cause, or leave some of the life spark behind.

At the moment, the team of scientists in Jupiter Space City is brewing related scientific exploration activities, and the mystery will really be revealed soon.

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