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Aliens could be living in the icy shell of Jupiter’s tiny moon Europa, say boffins.
The frigid world shares striking similarities with Greenland, home to shrimp, jellyfish, slugs, and snails.
Life could have evolved in shallow pockets of water near the surface, scientists reckon. They noticed ridges stretching hundreds of miles across the moon looked like similar features in north-west Greenland.
Dr Gregor Steinbrugge, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said: “People have been studying these double ridges for over 20 years now.
“But this is the first time we were actually able to watch something similar on Earth and see nature work out its magic.
“We are making a much bigger step into the direction of understanding what processes dominate the physics and dynamics of Europa’s ice shell.”
The ridges are described as “dramatic gashes” reaching nearly 1,000ft and separated by half-mile-wide valleys.
Prof Dustin Schroeder, of the University of Stanford, California, said: “There is a possibility life has a shot if there are pockets of water in the shell.
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“If the mechanism we see in Greenland is how these things happen on Europa, it suggests there is water everywhere.”
Prof Schroeder says his team noticed the similarity by chance, adding: “We were working on something totally different related to climate change and its impact on the surface of Greenland.”
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