Plume Origins and Plumbing: From Ocean to Surface

Abstract

The plume of Enceladus provides a unique window into subsurface processes in the ice shell and ocean of an icy world. Thanks to a decade of observations and modeling, a coherent picture is emerging of a thin ice shell extending across the south polar region, cut through by fractures directly connected to the underlying ocean, and at least partially filled with water. The plume jets emerging from the fractures directly sample this water reservoir. The shell undergoes daily tidal flexing, which modulates plume activity by opening and closing the fractures. Dissipation in the ice and conduit water components due to this flexing is likely to generate the several gigawatts of observed power that are lost from the south pole as infrared radiation and plume latent heat.