Science from the Europa Clipper Mission Concept: Exploring the Habitability of Europa

The Europa Clipper mission concept concentrates on remote sensing science that can be accomplished through multiple close flybys of Europa. This includes exploring Europa's ice shell for evidence of liquid water within or beneath it, in order to understand the thickness of the ice shell and potential material pathways from the ocean to the surface and from the surface to the ocean, and includes confirming the existence of an ocean and characterizing that ocean through geophysical measurements of Europa's gravitational tides and magnetic induction response. The mission concept also includes exploration of the surface and atmospheric composition of Europa, to address ocean composition and habitability. Detailed morphologic and topographic characterization of Europa's surface are included as well. In this presentation, we discuss the science that could be achieved by the Europa Clipper concept, a spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter that would make observations over the course of 32 flybys of Europa.