# Biomarkers on the Icy Jovian Moons: Can Europa Also Provide Insights into Life’s Origin?

## TL;DR

This paper explores how missions to Jupiter's icy moons, like Europa, could detect signs of life or clues about life's origin through chemical and isotopic analysis.

## Contribution

The paper introduces new methods for detecting biosignatures and lipid-based origins of life on icy moons using isotopic and amphiphile analysis.

## Key findings

- Mass spectrometers and chromatography instruments can detect isotopic and amphiphile biosignatures on icy moons.
- Detecting unusual isotope ratios could indicate biogenic processes, if abiotic explanations are ruled out.
- Lipid micelles on the surface of ocean worlds may provide insights into the first steps of life's evolution.

## Abstract

Within the payloads of JUICE and Europa Clipper, there are instruments suitable for the search of specific biosignatures that can diagnose life tracks in two ways. The payloads include mass spectrometers capable of measuring isotopic abundances for identifying life, and chromatography instruments testing whether ocean worlds harbor amphiphile mixtures, which would lead to a lipid-first origin of life. In this paper we describe how the two missions may begin to test whether there may be large detectable excursions of stable isotopes of chemical elements on the icy surfaces of the Jovian icy moons that are substantially shifted from their expected isotopic distributions. The detection of an unambiguous signal would suggest a biogenic origin, provided care is taken to exclude abiotic thermal isotopic fractionation. Our suggested tests should be confirmed independently with other techniques. Stable isotope geochemistry on the icy Jovian moons has not yet been thoroughly discussed in the literature. In addition, we enquire whether insights into life’s origin could be retrieved from Europa’s ocean and surface, including the question of the first steps in the evolution of life. Special emphasis has been put on an approach to seek on the surface of ocean worlds chemical phenomena that are rather primitive, such as reproducing lipid micelles as roots of protocells, but nevertheless can predict a path towards life with published models.