State of Stresses at Europa’s Icy Surface: a Strong Case for the Existence of a Subsurface Ocean

This report is mainly meant for researchers and MSc students interested in planetary sciences and with a strong mathematical background. In particular, chapter 8 and sections 11.1, 12.1 and 13.2 are highly mathematical as they deal with the development of the used methodology to compute the tidal response, deformation and stresses at the surface of Europa. Readers who are not interested in the method itself are free to skip the contents presented in the aforementioned sections with the exception of the discussions concerning figures 11.1, 11.2, 12.1, 12.2, 12.3, 13.1, 13.2, 13.3 and 13.4, as they are of vital importance to understand the results presented in the subsequent sections of those chapters. In addition, the mathematical foundations of tidal potential theory (section 3.3), tidal torque (section 4.2) and tidal dissipation (section 5.3) might be skipped by the reader if he/she understands the message behind equations 3.51, 4.30 and 5.22. Furthermore, the reader is encour-aged to read chapters 2 and 10 in order to get a larger insight about Europa. The extensive work presented in this document would have not been possible without the help of many people from the department and also from some international experts in the field. First, I would like to thank my supervisor Bert Vermeersen for his critical comments, his expertise, his open-minded view towards the topic and his patience during the last twenty months. In addition,