Nearly 20 years ago, the Cassini probe and its Huygens spacecraft peered beneath the hazy atmosphere of Saturn’s largest moon Titan and gave us our first glimpse of the moon’s strange surface.
Cassini-Huygens discovered that noxious liquids such as methane and ethane form a patchwork of streams, rivers and even seas as large as the Great Lakes.
Now, scientists examine images from Cassini have determined that titanium there may very well be another thing familiar to Earth sailors: waves. These scientists believe that those waves may be responsible for eroding and reshaping the shores of Lake Titan.
Connected: Largest sea on Saturn’s mysterious moon Titan may be more than 1,000 meters deep
First, the researchers simulated how coastlines would change under different conditions: They would experience no erosion; experiencing erosion from crashing waves; and experiencing erosion from the liquid slowly eating away at the lakeshore material. They then validated their simulation results with what Cassini saw.
Titan’s thick clouds block a visible light view of the Moon’s surface, but Cassini came equipped with a radar instrument that allowed it to map Titan’s mountains, canyons and, indeed, coastlines. The researchers selected Cassini tracks of four particularly large Titanian lakes – the largest of which, Kraken Mare, is similar in size to Earth’s largest lake, the Caspian Sea.
The researchers then reran their simulations with the shapes of these four lakes to determine which of the three processes produced shorelines that looked most similar to what Cassini saw. Wave-driven erosion came closest.
These results are the latest volley in an ongoing debate about whether Titan has waves or not. “Some people who tried to see evidence of waves saw none and said, ‘These seas are as smooth as mirrors,'” he said. Rose Palermoa geologist at the US Geological Survey and one of the researchers behind this study, at a statement. “Others said they saw some roughness on the liquid surface, but weren’t sure if the waves caused it.”
If it is true that Titan has waves, then it is likely that they are scattered by Titanian winds. Palermo and co-authors now want to study the waves to learn more about those winds—how strong they are and where they’re blowing.
The authors published their work in the journal Advances in science on June 19.
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Image Source : www.space.com