Interstellar Medium and Astrochemistry

Enceladus is a prime target in the search for life in our solar system, having an active plume likely connected to a large liquid water subsurface ocean.

Using the sensitive NIRSpec instrument onboard JWST, we searched for organic compounds and characterized the plume’s composition and structure. The observations directly sample the fluorescence emissions of H2O and reveal an extraordinarily extensive plume (up to 10,000 km or 40 Enceladus radii) at cryogenic temperatures (25 K) embedded in a large bath of emission originating from Enceladus’ torus.