VIMS sees tropical lakes in Shangri La! |
VIMS sees tropical lakes in Shangri La! |
Jun 14 2012, 06:30 AM
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#1
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Member Group: Members Posts: 701 Joined: 1-April 08 From: Minnesota ! Member No.: 4081 |
A news release has just appeared http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2012-172 concerning the discovery of possible 'tropical lakes' in the Shangri La area. A report will appear in Nature today. The area of Shangri La appears in the VIMS map below
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Jun 14 2012, 07:57 AM
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#2
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Member Group: Members Posts: 701 Joined: 1-April 08 From: Minnesota ! Member No.: 4081 |
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Jun 14 2012, 10:33 AM
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#3
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
Nature comment: http://www.nature.com/news/tropical-lakes-...or-life-1.10824
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Jun 14 2012, 03:43 PM
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#4
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
Location map here: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v486/...ure11165-s1.pdf
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Jun 14 2012, 06:20 PM
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#5
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1585 Joined: 14-October 05 From: Vermont Member No.: 530 |
It's amazing how tough Titan is to unravel, even with a huge array of instruments. Also props to Lunine for the "caverns measureless to man" quips. Cute.
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Jun 14 2012, 06:28 PM
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#6
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Member Group: Members Posts: 701 Joined: 1-April 08 From: Minnesota ! Member No.: 4081 |
Thanks for the link and supplement page Nigel. The figure from the Nature article supplement contains the areas of suspected lakes.
The “one imaged by Radar, containing dunes (purple&inset)” (white arrow below left) caught my attention as we had an interesting post awhile back showing this area as a relative low spot in a combined T8 SAR topo image combination. (see below, right). In the later animated figure the dark blue low spot contains the same "island" as is in the inset in the left figure. The Huygens landing site is also highlighted at the end of the animation. |
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Jun 14 2012, 07:34 PM
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#7
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Member Group: Members Posts: 796 Joined: 27-February 08 From: Heart of Europe Member No.: 4057 |
I think, that possible existence of lakes in equatorial areas is interesting, but not surprising. Not after that storm, which was on Titan last? year.
I see similarities between our current knowledge about Titan and our knowledge about Mars in Mariner 9 time. So we can expect many "big things" about Titan in future. (Which is fine ) -------------------- |
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Jun 14 2012, 09:12 PM
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#8
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 3233 Joined: 11-February 04 From: Tucson, AZ Member No.: 23 |
Thank you for posting those images, titanicrivers. Nicely illustrates why I am extremely skeptical about all this. I just think these are areas with dark interdune material, rather than lakes.
-------------------- &@^^!% Jim! I'm a geologist, not a physicist!
The Gish Bar Times - A Blog all about Jupiter's Moon Io |
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Jun 14 2012, 09:14 PM
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#9
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
You're not wrong machi. We're just beginning with that place. We'll have to send a whole university there eventually.
These articles remind us of the moisture found at the Huygens landing site. At the time the surface was compared with creme brulee, though later they backed off from the implications of that comparison by suggesting that the penetrometer striking and sliding off a pebble into dry sand would fit the data. Maybe it's time to resurrect the creme brulee. |
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Jun 14 2012, 09:49 PM
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#10
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Member Group: Members Posts: 796 Joined: 27-February 08 From: Heart of Europe Member No.: 4057 |
Titan is place hard to understand, so we can expect almost everything.
I read one article, written before Cassini-Huygens (~2000), in which authors stated, that's existence of big dunes on Titan is highly improbable. "At the time the surface was compared with creme brulee, though later they backed off from the implications of that comparison by suggesting that the penetrometer striking and sliding off a pebble into dry sand would fit the data." I think, that they still talked about material soaked by methane. This was based on evaporation of methane, which was registered by GCMS. The composition of surface vapours obtained by GCMS after landing shows that Huygens landed on a surface wet with methane, which evaporated as the cold soil was heated by the warmer probe. (from ESA) -------------------- |
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Jun 14 2012, 10:17 PM
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#11
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
I was initially a very strong scptic about any extraterrestrial liquids. VP's scepticism in this case must be respected. Nevertheless we have here a world where the atmospheric pressure greatly favours their presence. I could live with the idea of a thouroughly soaked Titan that is only superficially dry. An earthlike interleaving of porous and impervious materials could produce puddles in some areas while others, such as the Xanadu, are dry even though low in elevation. There could even be a correlation between oases and dunes. On this evidence both are present in Shangri-La; both are absent in Xanadu.
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Aug 16 2012, 02:28 AM
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#12
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 59 Joined: 12-March 10 From: Austin, TX Member No.: 5262 |
such as the Xanadu, are dry even though low in elevation. This appears to be a good place to ask a question I just came up with after watching the JPL Von Kamen lecture re Titan. There I first learned that Xanadu was low according the the gravitational model. However, the lecture also said that the equatorial regions are filled with ice/goop windblown dunes. How then could Xanadu NOT be filled with sand? I'd appreciate knowing if anybody has information about that. Thanks. |
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Aug 16 2012, 08:25 AM
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#13
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
We had an extended discussion about that some time ago - I'll try and find it. The bottom line is that 'sand' is not a liquid and its distribution is governed more by wind than by gravity, especially on Titan. Xanadu could be a region where the wind blows out more often than in.
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Aug 16 2012, 02:44 PM
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#14
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 59 Joined: 12-March 10 From: Austin, TX Member No.: 5262 |
We had an extended discussion about that some time ago - I'll try and find it. The bottom line is that 'sand' is not a liquid and its distribution is governed more by wind than by gravity, especially on Titan. Xanadu could be a region where the wind blows out more often than in. Thanks, I'd appreciate reading the discussion. |
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Aug 16 2012, 10:54 PM
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#15
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3516 Joined: 4-November 05 From: North Wales Member No.: 542 |
Thanks, I'd appreciate reading the discussion. Here you go: http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=5953 |
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