Lakes in the limelight, the 2013 image bonanza continues |
Lakes in the limelight, the 2013 image bonanza continues |
Sep 13 2013, 02:20 PM
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#101
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
A fantastic collection of new images of the northern lakes has just arrived: http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawi...?imageID=298704
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Apr 24 2017, 08:11 AM
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#102
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
Thanks for the informative replies.
Floating material (e.g. pumice rafts, or some sort of bubble foam) could explain both radar and near-IR brightness, as could surface roughness from wind or currents. A bubble plume, with voids in the methane column, could give radar backscatter, but not near-IR. Do we have any near-IR evidence either way for the original 'magic island'? If so I missed it. No, a bubble plume due to compositional mixing would not be anchored to the lake floor. So it seems to me we have two separate questions to answer regarding any bubble-related explanation for the transient features. What mechanism generates the bubbles, and in which way are they rendered visible? Mike, I wonder if you have any ideas on surfactant materials that might plausibly be present in Titan's seas? Perhaps this is another area where experimentation could prove fruitful. Can you produce a long-lasting foam under Titan conditions? |
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Apr 28 2017, 06:02 AM
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#103
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 2785 Joined: 10-November 06 From: Pasadena, CA Member No.: 1345 |
QUOTE So it seems to me we have two separate questions to answer regarding any bubble-related explanation for the transient features. What mechanism generates the bubbles, and in which way are they rendered visible? Mike, I wonder if you have any ideas on surfactant materials that might plausibly be present in Titan's seas? Perhaps this is another area where experimentation could prove fruitful. Can you produce a long-lasting foam under Titan conditions? Two ways you can make bubbles. 1) Heat up Titan liquids. Solubility of nitrogen in methane really drops off on heating. 2) Compositional mixing. Mix a liquid containing lotsa methane/nitrogen with liquid containing ethane (which doesn't like nitrogen so much). The excess will come out. As for surfactants, methane (and ethane but less so) is a lousy solvent. So any surfactants that could dissolve to an appreciable and useful extent is a very short list. In our experiments we get a huge amount of bubbles generated. So all our calculations were assuming instant N2 release and bubbles and we didn't worry about long-lasting foams. -------------------- Some higher resolution images available at my photostream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31678681@N07/
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