It's possible that within a decade, a space probe may swing into
orbit around Europa and hurl a drill-tipped robot into its icy
crust. If that turns out to be the case, no one will watch its
performance more anxiously than Christopher Wills and Jeffrey
Bada, the coauthors of The Spark of Life. As Europa orbits
around Jupiter, the giant planet's gravity exerts enormous tidal
forces on the moon with clock-like regularity-forces that Wills
and Bada predict should create an environment favorable to the
origin of life. If the probe does uncover some kind of
indigenous life on Europa, it may bolster the central claim of
this intriguing book: that similar processes made life possible
on our own planet.