Insights to Europa’s Chaos Terrain and Geologic History through Global and Regional Geologic Mapping

Abstract:

Europa, a moon of Jupiter, exhibits a tantalizingly young icy surface and a subsurface liquid water ocean. Evaluating the potential habitability of Europa requires an understanding of the geology that drives the interaction between the surface and the deeper interior of the body. To this end, we have constructed a global geologic map at the scale of 1:15M. In order to provide greater insight into the broad global stratigraphic relations and provide concrete observations on specific surface features, we are currently mosaicking and mapping, with a consistent set of units, the surface imaged at 100-250 m/pixel (~10% of the total surface area) placed in the global-scale context. The formation of chaos terrains—consisting of blocks of preexisting terrain and hummocky matrix material—on Europa is of particular interest to the astrobiological community and has been intensely studied and debated. As such, we have focused our initial regional mapping efforts on chaos terrains. In this talk, I will discuss the new global geologic map, preliminary results from regional scale mapping efforts, insights that this mapping provides on the formation of chaos terrain, and potential implications for Europa’s evolution.

Bio:

Erin Leonard is currently a research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology. Her research focuses on geomorphologic mapping of icy satellites and the Moon, and how these surface observations can lead to implications for the surface and subsurface evolution of the body. Erin is a Project Staff Scientist on the Europa Clipper mission and the lead author on the global geologic map of Europa for the United States Geologic Survey (USGS). More information on Erin can be found at: https://science.jpl.nasa.gov/people/leonard/