The lakes on Saturn's moon can be blast craters

Titan was studied by NASA's Cassini spacecraft before the end of her mission in 2017. A recent study of radar data collected by Cassini while she was watching Titan suggests how lakes on Titan could be formed at the base. The study published this week in the journal Nature Geosciences.

Now, researchers who have studied these images suggest that areas of liquid nitrogen in Titan's crust have become explosive when they have warmed up, creating steep, steep edges around craters where liquid methane could reside.

"The rim goes up and the karst process works in the opposite direction," said Giuseppe Mitri, head of the research team at the G. Annunzio University in Italy. "We did not find any explanation for a karst lake basin, but the morphology was more compatible with an explosion crater, where the edge is formed by the material ejected from the inside. Crater is a totally different process. "

This model for craters could actually help present different periods of warming and cooling on the moon. Although it is negative at 290 degrees Fahrenheit, Titan has experienced different periods that help replenish its methane. The methane contained in the lakes of Titan is also present in its atmosphere.

During periods of cooling on Titan, nitrogen was probably the key element of the atmosphere, raining on the crust and accumulating below. Then, the warming would cause the nitrogen to turn into expanding vapor to create a crater.

"These steep-sided lakes, ramparts, and steep banks would mark the times in Titan's history when there was liquid nitrogen on the surface and in the crust," said co-author Jonathan Lunine. Cassini study and scientist.

Although the Cassini mission has finally plunged into the atmosphere of Saturn in 2017, the data collected by the mission will feed studies for the years to come.

"This is a completely different explanation of the steep edges around these small lakes, which is a huge puzzle," said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "As scientists continue to exploit the Cassini data treasure, we will continue to assemble more and more pieces of the puzzle, and in the coming decades we will understand the Saturn system better and better."

Explore Titan in the future

"It's the first drone to land and it can travel more than 160 km through the thick atmosphere of Titan," said Jim Bridenstine, NASA's director, in a statement. "Titan is quite similar to the beginning of the Earth.The Dragonfly instruments will help evaluate the organic chemistry and chemical signatures of past or present life.We will launch Dragonfly to explore the frontiers of human knowledge for the benefit of all. # 39; humanity. "

The ultimate goal is for Dragonfly to go into an impact crater, where they believe that life-essential ingredients have mixed up when something has hit Titan in the past, there may be some tens of thousands of years.

Titan is chemically similar to Earth before life has evolved, the agency said. They want to explore the sand dunes on Titan to determine if they are made of the same complex organic material discovered in the atmosphere.

"Titan has the essential ingredients for life," said Lori Glaze, director of NASA's Global Science Division. "It contains complex organic molecules and the energy necessary for life.We will have the opportunity to observe processes similar to those occurring at the beginning of the Earth when life has formed and conditions that could hold life today, we can look for biosignatures. "

Once Dragonfly has landed, she will spend two and a half years flying around Titan. It only has propellers, with skids to land, but no wheels to allow it to move on the surface.

It will be launched in 2026, but will not reach Titan before 2034 because Saturn is so far from us.

Dragonfly will also explore Titan's atmosphere, surface properties, underwater ocean and surface liquids.