phew! better put my pants back on then.
thanks benny

Actually I find this pretty exciting news in terms of science related press conferences

i was pulling for something big....

"We're blowing up the moon!"

from drudge:

http://www.drudgereport.com/flash8na.htm

NASA'S CASSINI DISCOVERS POTENTIAL LIQUID WATER ON ENCELADUS
Thu Mar 09 2006 11:21:33 ET

**Exclusive**

NASA's Cassini spacecraft may have found evidence of liquid water reservoirs that erupt in Yellowstone-like geysers on Saturn's moon Enceladus. The rare occurrence of liquid water so near the surface raises many new questions about the mysterious moon.

"We realize that this is a radical conclusion - that we may have evidence for liquid water within a body so small and so cold," said Carolyn Porco, Cassini imaging team leader at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. "However, if we are right, we have significantly broadened the diversity of solar system environments where we might possibly have conditions suitable for living organisms."

High-resolution Cassini images show icy jets and towering plumes ejecting huge quantities of particles at high speed. Scientists examined several models to explain the process. They ruled out the idea the particles are produced or blown off the moon's surface by vapor created when warm water ice converts to a gas. Instead, scientists have found evidence for a much more exciting possibility. The jets might be erupting from near-surface pockets of liquid water above 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit), like cold versions of the Old Faithful geyser in Yellowstone.

"We previously knew of at most three places where active volcanism exists: Jupiter's moon Io, Earth, and possibly Neptune's moon Triton. Cassini changed all that, making Enceladus the latest member of this very exclusive club, and one of the most exciting places in the solar system," said John Spencer, Cassini scientist, Southwest Research Institute, Boulder.

-more--2-

"Other moons in the solar system have liquid-water oceans covered by kilometers of icy crust," said Andrew Ingersoll, imaging team member and atmospheric scientist at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif. "What's different here is that pockets of liquid water may be no more than tens of meters below the surface."

"As Cassini approached Saturn, we discovered the Saturnian system is filled with oxygen atoms. At the time we had no idea where the oxygen was coming from," said Candy Hansen, Cassini scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena. "Now we know Enceladus is spewing out water molecules, which break down into oxygen and hydrogen."

Scientists still have many questions. Why is Enceladus so active? Are other sites on Enceladus active? Might this activity have been continuous enough over the moon's history for life to have had a chance to take hold in the moon's interior?

In the spring of 2008, scientists will get another chance to look at Enceladus when Cassini flies within 350 kilometers (approximately 220 miles), but much work remains after the spacecraft's four-year prime mission is over.

"There's no question, along with the moon Titan, Enceladus should be a very high priority for us. Saturn has given us two exciting worlds to explore," said Jonathan Lunine, Cassini interdisciplinary scientist, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.

Mission scientists report these and other Enceladus findings in this week's issue of Science.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology

NASA's Cassini Discovers Potential Liquid Water on Enceladus

03.09.06


NASA's Cassini spacecraft may have found evidence of liquid water reservoirs that erupt in Yellowstone-like geysers on Saturn's moon Enceladus. The rare occurrence of liquid water so near the surface raises many new questions about the mysterious moon.



"We realize that this is a radical conclusion -- that we may have evidence for liquid water within a body so small and so cold," said Dr. Carolyn Porco, Cassini imaging team leader at Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo. "However, if we are right, we have significantly broadened the diversity of solar system environments where we might possibly have conditions suitable for living organisms."

High-resolution Cassini images show icy jets and towering plumes ejecting large quantities of particles at high speed. Scientists examined several models to explain the process. They ruled out the idea that the particles are produced by or blown off the moon's surface by vapor created when warm water ice converts to a gas. Instead, scientists have found evidence for a much more exciting possibility -- the jets might be erupting from near-surface pockets of liquid water above 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit), like cold versions of the Old Faithful geyser in Yellowstone.

Mission scientists report these and other Enceladus findings in this week's issue of Science.

"We previously knew of at most three places where active volcanism exists: Jupiter's moon Io, Earth, and possibly Neptune's moon Triton. Cassini changed all that, making Enceladus the latest member of this very exclusive club, and one of the most exciting places in the solar system," said Dr. John Spencer, Cassini scientist, Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, Colo.

"Other moons in the solar system have liquid-water oceans covered by kilometers of icy crust," said Dr. Andrew Ingersoll, imaging team member and atmospheric scientist at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif. "What's different here is that pockets of liquid water may be no more than tens of meters below the surface."

Other unexplained oddities now make sense. "As Cassini approached Saturn, we discovered that the Saturnian system is filled with oxygen atoms. At the time we had no idea where the oxygen was coming from," said Dr. Candy Hansen, Cassini scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. "Now we know that Enceladus is spewing out water molecules, which break down into oxygen and hydrogen."

Scientists are also seeing variability at Enceladus. "Even when Cassini is not flying close to Enceladus, we can detect that the plume's activity has been changing through its varying effects on the soup of electrically-charged particles that flow past the moon," said Dr. Geraint H. Jones, Cassini scientist, magnetospheric imaging instrument, Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany.

Scientists still have many questions. Why is Enceladus currently so active? Are other sites on Enceladus active? Might this activity have been continuous enough over the moon's history for life to have had a chance to take hold in the moon's interior?

"Our search for liquid water has taken a new turn. The type of evidence for liquid water on Enceladus is very different from what we've seen at Jupiter's moon Europa. On Europa the evidence from surface geological features points to an internal ocean. On Enceladus the evidence is direct observation of water vapor venting from sources close to the surface," said Dr. Peter Thomas, Cassini imaging scientist, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.

In the spring of 2008, scientists will get another chance to look at Enceladus when Cassini flies within 350 kilometers (approximately 220 miles), but much work remains after Cassini's four-year prime mission is over.

"There's no question that, along with the moon Titan, Enceladus should be a very high priority for us. Saturn has given us two exciting worlds to explore," said Dr. Jonathan Lunine, Cassini interdisciplinary scientist, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. JPL, a division of the Caltech, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. The Cassini orbiter was designed, developed and assembled at JPL.

For images and more information, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov .


Carolina Martinez (818) 354-9382
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Erica Hupp/Dwayne Brown (202) 358-1237/1726
NASA Headquarters, Washington

2006-033

Astrobiology research funded by NASA has made a tremendous new discovery which could "fundamentally change the knowledge about what comprises all known life on Earth," according to NASA.
The major finding announced today has fueled speculation recently that reached a fever pitch after the agency said the finding "will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life."

While the discovery is not extraterrestrial life, NASA has indeed uncovered an entirely new life form on our planet that "doesn't share the biological building blocks of anything currently living" on Earth, Gizmodo reports.

Discovered in the poisonous Mono Lake, California, this bacteria is made of arsenic, something that was thought to be completely impossible. While she and other scientists theorized that this could be possible, this is the first discovery. The implications of this discovery are enormous to our understanding of life itself and the possibility of finding beings in other planets that don't have to be like planet Earth.

The controversial claim that one microbe can use arsenic in its cellular machinery is mired in scientific quicksand after scientists attempting to duplicate the finding have come up empty-handed. Though the microbe in question clearly thrives in the presence of the usually toxic substance, there is no evidence that the bacterium requires arsenic to live or incorporates the element in its DNA, researchers report in a paper posted February 1 at arXiv.org.