ICY SCIENCE: SCIENCE SPACE ASTRONOMY Spring 2014 | Page 37

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It can be easy for people who are familiar with life making things like methane and ammonia to leap to the
conclusion that all those chemicals found in the jets mean that life created them. Cassini isn’t a life-searching robot so can’t analyze things in that way. And we aren’t going to know for awhile yet. In its Science Plan
NASA isn’t planning a mission to Enceladus because it doesn’t have the funding. In terms of planetary research,
NASA’s highest priority is all about Mars, with the intent on sending humans to Mars in the 2030s. Yet they
don’t have the money even for this, their highest priority. Politics calls the shots and is using the economic
crash as an excuse to not fund projects, some of which NASA had already started work on with international
partners. But fortunately, the European Space Agency, along with a few other space agencies, is working on the
technology that will be needed for missions to Europa (Europa Explore "