New discoveries on the Moon Titan

NASA's Cassini spacecraft that unlocked many of the mysteries of Saturn and its moons including the fascinating Titan ended its mission with a dramatic descent to the giant planet in 2017, however, only now is analysis of the voluminous data collected by Cassini during Their 13 years of exploration are revealing intriguing new discoveries about the seas of liquid hydrocarbons on the surface of Titan, the second largest moon in our solar system.

It is shrouded in an orange haze that reminds us of the pollution that exists here and is the only place in the solar system besides Earth of course that is known to have liquid seas on the surface, but unlike Earth where we see water, these seas They are composed of methane and ethane elements of natural gas.

A recent study focused on three seas near the North Pole of Titan Kraken Mare, the largest of all with an area comparable to the Caspian Sea, Liga Mare and Punga Mare. Cassini radar observations revealed that the chemical composition of these seas varies. depending on the latitude with some areas being richer in windowpane and others in ethane, in addition the analysis identified undulations on the surface of the seas which suggests the presence of tidal currents and greater agitation near the estuaries.

Titan with its 5,150 km in diameter is larger than Mercury and only a little smaller than Ganymede, Jupiter's largest moon, both Titan and the Earth share the peculiarity of having hydrological cycles where liquids evaporate, form clouds and then fall back into the surface, but on Titan this cycle is fueled by liquid methane due to low temperatures.

Valerio Poggiali, an engineer at Cornell University and lead author of the study, describes Titan as an Earth-like world with a diversity of landforms shaped by a hydrological system of methane; seas and lakes of liquid hydrocarbons are fed by channels of precipitation that form estuaries and deltas very similar to terrestrial river systems.

Data indicate that rivers on Titan carry liquid methane that mixes with ethane-rich seas, similar to the mixing of fresh and salt water on Earth, Titan is considered to have conditions that could be suitable for life on the moon. It may harbor a vast underground ocean of liquid water, and the complex chemistry of its atmosphere raises questions about the possibility of prebiotic processes.

Valerio Poggiali suggests that the interactions between organic materials and liquid water on Titan could be similar to those that led to the origin of life on Earth.

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