Posted on 07/24/2006 6:56:41 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
Scientists said Monday they have found the first widespread evidence of giant hydrocarbon lakes on the surface of Saturn's planet-size moon Titan.
The cluster of hydrocarbon lakes was spotted near Titan's frigid north pole during a weekend flyby by the international Cassini spacecraft, which flew within 590 miles of the moon.
Researchers counted about a dozen lakes ranging from 6 miles to 62 miles wide. Some lakes, which appeared as dark patches in radar images, were connected by channels while others had tributaries flowing into them. Several were dried up, but the ones that contained liquid were most likely a mix of methane and ethane.
"It was a real potpourri," said Cassini scientist Jonathan Lunine of the University of Arizona.
Titan is one of two moons in the solar system known to possess a significant atmosphere similar to primordial Earth. But scientists have long puzzled over the source of its hazy atmosphere rich in nitrogen and methane.
Scientists believe methane gas breaks up in Titan's atmosphere and forms smog clouds that then rain methane down to the surface. But the source of methane inside the moon, which is releasing the gas into the atmosphere is still unknown, Lunine said.
Last year, Cassini found what appeared to be a liquid hydrocarbon lake about the size of Lake Ontario on Titan's south pole. But the recent flyby marked the first time the spacecraft spied a multitude of lakes.
Cassini's next Titan encounter will be Sept. 7 when it will be 620 miles away.
Cassini, funded by NASA and the European and Italian space agencies, was launched in 1997 and took seven years to reach Saturn to explore the ringed planet and its numerous moons. The mission is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
Cassini's accompanying probe, Huygens, developed and controlled by the ESA, touched down on Titan in 2005.
Do you post this unoriginal stupid reply on every thread, or only on ones that you don't understand?
OK so we've been taught that hydrocarbons are the results of plant matter in the pre-historic swamps. hence the term fossil fuels. If thats the case then I wanna know how the plants got there?
Or is this proof of life on other planets?
Nah. I'm designing a wormhole to transport these compounds as we speak. Natural gas prices are about to go down!
Fill Er UP!
There's more than one way to make a hydrocarbon.
"One of these lakes can handle all of our energy needs for hundreds of years, IMO. There's gotta be a way to harness the energy."
A REALLLY long siphon tube. Course we could go there and have huge oil tanks running across the solar system. Then the environmentalist would be complaining about the effects of oil spills on the shores of the astroid belt.
There's the "Big Inch" and the "Little Big Inch" (from WWII); now we can have the "Really Big Inch"!
Please, no bragging. This is a family-oriented thread.
So specular reflections from them are hard to see because they're at high latitudes.
"There's more than one way to make a hydrocarbon."
Thats kinda my point. If there's more than one way for hydrocarbons to be on Titan then there is probably more than one way on earth. Which would raise the possibility that "fossil" fuels aren't necessarily a non-renewable resource. And that said fuels may have been or may be created by other processes within the earth. That would mean the oil reserves could be a renewable resource.
Not my original idea, I read a report from a NASA scientist proposing this idea about 3 months ago based on this data.
Obviously, its from decaying dinosaurs and ferns. Thats the only place it can possible come from here on earth.
The trick would be to keep these “Gases liquid as your transport approaches the Sun.
I would imagine the pressures would escalate quite rapidly as sunlight on the transports surface intensifies.
That would be one heckuva mission.. maybe a stopoff at Mars and then onto Titan.. I hope you're young, this is definitely quite a few years down the road at the rate
Nasa is moving.
Ping?
Well, we could ignite it and aim it at the sun for a great July 4th display.
That looks like the surface of most of the roads in northeast Ohio.
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