Icy Jupiter moon may be actively recycling its surface

Europa, the intriguing ice-encrusted moon of Jupiter, may be resurfaced through plate tectonics, scientists have discovered. The result would make Europa the only known body in the solar system besides Earth with plate tectonics, a process in which cold giant platters of crust—or in this case, ice—float around on top of warmer, more viscous layers in the body’s interior. The discovery also makes the moon more interesting in the search for extraterrestrial life, because the recycling action of plate tectonics would provide an important way to exchange chemicals between the surface and the water ocean that lies beneath the moon’s ice cap.