# @nasa on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/CthmpcFrnHW
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/7285173-nasa-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/fa02951a70.jpg
- **Posted:** 2023-06-15T20:50:54.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** NASA (@NASA) — https://gondola.cc/NASA

## Caption

Beneath the most reflective surface in our solar system, the frozen white crust of Saturn’s moon Enceladus hides a subsurface ocean that erupts through the crevasses in its icy crust.⁣
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A team of international scientists has discovered an essential ingredient for life as we know it – the element phosphorus – among the salt-rich grains ejected from Enceladus’ geysers, using data from our Cassini spacecraft, which orbited Saturn and its moons from 2004 to 2017. Phosphorous is a building block for DNA and a crucial part of energy-carrying molecules present in all life on Earth.⁣
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Image description: Our Cassini spacecraft captures this view of Enceladus in enhanced-color, showing its white surface marked with long cracks and crevasses, unveiling light blue highlights. Black space surrounds the Moon.⁣
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Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute⁣
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#Space #SolarSystem #NASA #Cassini #Saturn #Ice #Ocean

## Stats

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- **Likes:** 2,028,132
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## Tags

ice, nasa, space, ocean, cassini, saturn, solarsystem

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