Click HERE for an extra large, zoomable version (source The Register)
Its an old picture taken by the Galileo probe, stitched together from separate pictures taken between 1995 and 1998, but it has been enhanced using near-infra-red green and violet filters for the first time.
It's thought that Europa has a 100 km thick watery layer to it, the upper part being a frozen crust, and the lower part is thought to be a liquid ocean. Magnetic detections suggest a salty conductive watery layer, and it appears to be mobile, so it's not frozen to the sea floor. The massive gravitational pull of nearby Jupiter is likely to be causing tidal flexing of the ice and keeping it from freezing solid. It occasionally kicks out 200 km tall plumes of water too.
The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is a planned European Space Agency mission to fly by Jupiter's icy moons Europa, Callisto and Ganymede to probe them further for possible signs of life.
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