Hydrocarbon solids fall like soot from the moon's dark skies. Observations by the European Space Agency's Huygens probe, which Cassini carried to Titan,Īnd by NASA's Voyager spacecraft strongly hint that both methane rain and dark orange Is no longer just a mere bright spot, but a land where rivers flow down to a sunless sea," Lunine said. "Although Titan gets far less sunlight and is much smaller and colder than Earth, Xanadu Image credit: NASA/JPL + Full image and caption Image left: Partial view of radar image of Titan, with a focus on an area called Xanadu. Temperatures, the liquid cannot be water it is almost certainly methane or ethane. It found a surface modified by winds, rain, and the flow of liquids.
When Cassini's radar system viewed Xanadu on April 30, 2006, Xanadu was first discovered by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in 1994 as a striking bright Material, while a dark region might be smoother or more absorbing material, possibly liquid. In the radar images, bright regions indicate rough or scattering
Radar instrument can see through the haze by bouncing radio signals off the surface and Titan is a place of twilight, dimmed by a haze of hydrocarbons surrounding it. "Surprisingly, this cold, faraway region has geological features remarkably like Earth." Lunine, Cassini interdisciplinary scientist at the University of Arizona, Tucson. Under Cassini's powerful radar eyes, facts are replacing speculation," said Dr. "We could only speculate about the nature of this mysterious bright country, too farįrom us for details to be revealed by Earth-based and space-based telescopes. Image right: Radar movie of Titan, showing a variety of geologic features, including impact craters, wind-blown deposits, channels and cryovolcanic features. More channels snake through the eastern part of Xanadu,Įnding on a dark plain where dunes, abundant elsewhere, seem absent. A crater formed by the impact of an asteroid or by water
These narrow river networks flow onto darkerĪreas, which may be lakes. At the region's western edge, dark sand dunes give way to land cut by Show Xanadu is surrounded by darker terrain, reminiscent of a free-standing These radar images, from a strip more than 4,500 kilometers (2,796 miles) long, Similar to Earth on Xanadu, an Australia-sized, bright region on Saturn's moon Titan. New radar images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft revealed geological features
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