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There's table salt on Jupiter's moon Europa

By The Salt AlmanacPublished November 8, 2026

Jupiter's moon Europa, an icy white and tan sphere crossed by reddish-brown cracks
Europa in approximately natural colour, assembled from Galileo spacecraft images. Yellowish areas such as Tara Regio are where sodium chloride was identified in 2019.NASA / JPL-Caltech / SETI Institute. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons · Image source

In 2019, Caltech and NASA JPL scientists used the Hubble Space Telescope to show that the yellow colour of Tara Regio on Europa matches sodium chloride darkened by radiation. If the salt rose from the moon's hidden ocean, that ocean may be more like Earth's seas than scientists thought, though that is not yet proven.

Read the full story: Sodium chloride (NaCl)

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The Salt Almanac. (2026, November 8). There's table salt on jupiter's moon europa. https://saltalmanac.com/did-you-know/europa-table-salt

Original sources

  1. Caltech Linde Center. Table salt compound spotted on Europa (2019). https://lindecenter.caltech.edu/news/table-salt-compound-spotted-europa