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00:00It's so close to us, at least in terms of space, but there's still so much we don't
00:06know about the moon yet.
00:08For example, Chinese researchers have collected soil samples from the moon and found out there
00:13might be billions of tiny glass spheres on the lunar surface.
00:17What's really cool is that they might hold enormous amounts of water.
00:23These tiny spheres form when meteorites hit the moon at crazy speeds, sometimes at hundreds
00:29of thousands of miles per hour.
00:32When that happens, a strong explosion sends bits of the moon's crust flying into the
00:37air like popcorn.
00:40As these chunks of crust cool down, they create little glass beads that look like tiny glittering
00:45spheres.
00:47These beads are so small that they're like crumbs sprinkled over the moon's surface.
00:52Scientists call them impact glass.
00:57And it turns out the soil on the moon is holding a secret ingredient that can make water, oxygen.
01:03So these tiny glass balls are like little capsules with oxygen inside.
01:09There's a special type of wind called solar wind, and it's made of protons and electrons.
01:14When protons hit the capsules, they mix with the oxygen inside and finally make water.
01:23The most amazing part is that some of these glass balls with water inside get hidden under
01:28a layer of the moon's dust called regolith.
01:32So if we go on a mission to the moon, we'll have hidden reservoirs of water underground.
01:37It's as if someone has prepared some canned food for us to survive.
01:42Because you can't drink that water directly from these glass beads, you're supposed to
01:46collect them and then boil them in an oven to extract the water.
01:50When they cool, they release vapor, so you'll have regular liquid water in a bottle.
01:56That way, astronauts on their missions will be able to stay longer up there, considering
02:00these secret stashes.
02:03And the coolest thing is that these glass beads are very common on the moon.
02:08They're spread from the poles to the equator, which means there might be enough water even
02:12for generations that might come to live there one day.
02:19There are other spots where we can find water in space, too.
02:23For example, scientists found an extremely big cloud of water vapor that's 12 billion
02:28light years away from us.
02:30Not within reach, of course, but it's still good to know.
02:34And we're talking about something bigger than we can imagine.
02:38It's thought the cloud contains at least 140 trillion times the amount of water in all
02:43the oceans and seas on our home planet.
02:48Even swimming or scuba diving there.
02:50It's like taking a dip in a giant water balloon that's traveling through space.
02:54I mean, you wouldn't have a way out, considering the amount of water in there, but hey, at
02:59least the view would be magnificent.
03:04Water is actually everywhere across our solar system.
03:08It's mostly in the shape of atmospheric gas or ice, and sometimes even in its liquid form.
03:14And there are probably many water worlds in our galaxy, too.
03:18Scientists from the University of Copenhagen have discovered exciting new evidence about
03:23how planets form in our solar system and beyond.
03:27Their computer models have confirmed the interesting theory of pebble accretion, which means that
03:32planets form from tiny pieces of ice and dust.
03:37This theory is based on the observation of disks around young stars that are made up
03:41of pebbles that come in several hundred Earth masses.
03:45As these pebbles collide and clump together, they form protoplanets and eventually planets.
03:52What's even more exciting is water could be an important ingredient in this planet's making.
03:59It also means that the water may not have come to Earth by chance, for instance, via
04:04icy comets hitting our home planet.
04:06Instead, maybe it was there from the very beginning.
04:10Perhaps planets in our neighborhood, like Mars and Venus, formed with water as well.
04:17Scientists also say we shouldn't assume we're a special case just because we have water.
04:22There could be many planets all over our Milky Way galaxy as big as Earth that have water, too.
04:29That means there could be many worlds in our galaxy with continents and oceans, which could
04:33also mean there is a great deal of life out there waiting to be discovered.
04:41But just because there's water somewhere, it doesn't mean that place would be a good
04:45spot for an interstellar summer vacation for future generations.
04:50Water on many planets is probably embedded in rock or fills underground oceans.
04:57Researchers have checked more than 40 exoplanets we know about.
05:01They're all smaller than Neptune and located around something we call red dwarf stars.
05:07These make up 80% of all stars we're familiar with in our galaxy.
05:12They're cooler than our Sun and also the smallest type of hydrogen-burning stars.
05:18And there could be more planets with enormous amounts of water than we thought.
05:23Plus, this water can take up to half of the total mass of these planets.
05:29Scientists know this because they've been studying the density of these exoplanets.
05:33They have realized they're too light to be made entirely out of rock.
05:40I've mentioned Venus before.
05:42Today, it's a hot, rocky planet a bit smaller than Earth, with a dry atmosphere and only
05:47some traces of water vapor.
05:50It's also very poor in oxygen.
05:53But in its early stages, the planet may have been a completely different world with liquid
05:57water and even clouds, which means it's possible there used to be life.
06:05What if Venus used to be similar to Earth, with oceans and moderate temperatures?
06:11It would be great if it stayed that way, because these seem like good conditions to develop
06:15life.
06:16So we'd probably be writing letters to some of our space friends from there or visiting
06:21them already.
06:23The scenario went in a different direction for Venus about 700 million years ago or so.
06:29The planet got so hot it lost all of its oxygen.
06:33That's why it wasn't able to form liquid water on its surface.
06:37Instead, it developed a thick atmosphere made up of carbon dioxide, which made this world
06:44even hotter than Mercury, even though it's twice as far from the Sun.
06:50Even icy comets pelting it couldn't bring water back to its surface.
06:54We can't do it either in some artificial way.
06:56It would be like trying to grow a delicate flower in a desert.
07:00No matter how much you water it, if the conditions are too dry and harsh, the flower won't survive.
07:08But some people thought the water in the atmosphere of our close neighbor could be enough for
07:13developing life.
07:14Plus, scientists have discovered there is a compound called phosphine that's often associated
07:20with living organisms on Earth.
07:23Maybe in the past this was enough.
07:25Today, the amount of water on Venus is so small, even our toughest microbes that are
07:30extremely tolerant to droughts wouldn't be able to stay alive there.
07:37Phosphine is still a cool discovery worth investigating, but not something that tells
07:41us there could be life on Venus.
07:44But Jupiter might be a more likely option for that.
07:47The Galileo probe flew through the atmosphere of this magnificent gas giant to measure the
07:52temperature and water activity.
07:55It found out there was enough water for life to exist in the planet's clouds, but sadly,
08:01there are not enough nutrients there.
08:03Plus, there's too much ultraviolet radiation, so most organisms wouldn't actually be able
08:08to survive there.
08:11And everyone knows Europa, one of Jupiter's moons.
08:15It's that very place in our solar system that has the biggest chances to support life.
08:20Its icy crust probably hides an ocean underneath.
08:23And because of Jupiter's gravity that affects Europa, the ocean is not frozen, but remains
08:29liquid.
08:30The ocean might be warm under that icy crust, probably thanks to hydrothermal vents.
08:37Enceladus, one of Saturn's moons, probably has even higher chances to host life than
08:42Europa.
08:44And it's one of the best candidates to have a beautiful, warm, and salty ocean beneath
08:48the surface.
08:50It has the coolest ice geysers that catapult into space about 1,000 tons of water every
08:56hour!
08:57Together with salt, organic molecules, and some other materials.