A new research published in Nature Communications sheds further light on Titan’s peculiar pools of water, which include waves and currents. Earth is not the only place in the solar system with rivers, lakes, and seas. Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, also has these features, but they are made of liquid hydrocarbons like ethane and methane instead of water. Titan possesses hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth, New scientist reported.
A new paper published in Nature Communications provides more insights into Titan’s unusual bodies of water, including waves, currents, estuaries, and straits. This research utilises archived data from NASA’s Cassini mission, which orbited Saturn from 2004 to 2017, and whose Huygens probe sent back the first images of Titan’s surface in 2005, revealing ancient dry shorelines and methane rivers.
As NASA prepares to launch its Dragonfly spacecraft to Titan in 2027, gaining more information about Titan’s bodies of water will aid mission planning. Titan has the most Earth-like atmosphere we know, with 98% nitrogen and 2% methane, rain, ice, lakes, oceans, valleys, mountain ridges, mesas, and dunes. Its topography is typified by enormous dune fields, flat plains, and polar regions with vast oceans and liquid hydrocarbon reservoirs. Titan’s surface temperature is approximately -290 degrees Fahrenheit (-179 degrees Celsius), and its gravity is 14% of Earth’s. It only receives 1% of the sunlight that Earth does.
Though Titan is substantially different from Earth, aerial and radar photographs illustrate how the flow of liquid methane has formed its surface in a manner similar to Earth. Titan has the most Earth-like atmosphere we know, with 98% nitrogen and 2% methane, rain, ice, lakes, oceans, valleys, mountain ridges, mesas, and dunes. Its topography is typified by enormous dune fields, flat plains, and polar regions with vast oceans and liquid hydrocarbon reservoirs. Titan’s surface temperature is approximately -290 degrees Fahrenheit (-179 degrees Celsius), and its gravity is 14% of Earth’s. It only receives 1% of the sunlight that Earth does.
Though Titan is substantially different from Earth, aerial and radar photographs illustrate how the flow of liquid methane has formed its surface in a manner similar to Earth.
NASA’s Dragonfly mission, which is scheduled to reach Titan in 2034, will span two years. The project will comprise a rotorcraft that will fly to different areas every Titan day (16 Earth days) to collect samples of the moon’s primordial chemistry. It will also look for chemical biosignatures, probe the moon’s active methane cycle, and study prebiotic chemistry in both the atmosphere and the surface.
“Dragonfly is a spectacular science mission with broad community interest, and we are excited to take the next steps on this mission,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Exploring Titan will push the boundaries of what we can do with rotorcraft outside of Earth.”
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