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Liquid Lakes On Saturn's Moon Confirmed
Riding with Robots writes "Scientists have been using the robotic spacecraft Cassini to explore what looked to be large lakes of hydrocarbons on the surface of Saturn's planet-sized moon Titan. But they couldn't be entirely sure that the features were actually liquid lakes, and not simply very smooth, solid material. Now, new findings seem to confirm that the observations really do show extensive seas of liquid ethane and other hydrocarbons. In fact, Titan seems to have an entire 'water' cycle of ethane evaporation, rain and rivers."
This is the official "invade Saturn" thread. Please post all jokes about the united states invading Saturn here, so as not to contaminate more serious discussion.
On another note, can anyone tell me about the chances of this being a good environment for oil eating bacteria?
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
If by the time we get out there we've exhausted our own supply of hydrocarbons we know there are plenty waiting for us.
Given how valuable they are as a raw material I would assume the plan wouldn't be to burn them..
FTA: "[T]hese particles form a ubiquitous hydrocarbon haze that hinders the view."
Sounds just like LA.
Kewl! I want to go Surfing!
Pacifist paratroopers yell, "Ghandi!" when they jump.
There's our chance to lower the gas price and test if the Global warming is a myth. Import it from Saturn.
On another tought, how about a refuelling station there for space exploration ?
"This makes Titan the only body in our solar system beyond Earth known to have liquid on its surface."
i thought venus had molten metal rivers on it's surface. or is it just an uncorfimed hypotesis ?
anyone more knowledged tham me could please step forward ?
What ? Me, worry ?
Please tell me that all these rovers on Mars were just there to train for the real thing on Titan.
No seriously, picture how awesome it would be to explore Titan with rovers. This place is probably the one place in the Solar system that has the most in common with our planet! The fact that it still has rivers and liquid lakes makes it so much more interesting than Mars, plus it has a thick atmosphere (5 times our atmosphere on the surface) we could probably send a UAV there or a blimp.
You just got troll'd!
Does anyone know if Titan is in tidal lock with Saturn? Anyone know if there exists a list of which moons are in tidal lock and which aren't?
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
"Operation Titan Freedom"??
Excellent presentation on the moons of Saturn by Carolyn Porco, leader of the Cassini mission imaging team at the 2007 TED conference. (video)
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/carolyn_porco_flies_us_to_saturn.html
Before anyone comes up with the idea to mine the hydrocarbonates on Titan to overcome the oil and energy crisis on Earth, hold your breath!
The energy necessary to accelerate the mined hydrocarbonates enough to transfer them to Earth is higher than the actual energy equivalent you get by burning the hydrocarbonates. That's because you would have to accelerate the Titan-oil from 9.7 km/sec (orbital speed of Saturn) to 29.7 km/sec (orbital speed of Earth).
Anyone else read the headline as:
Liquid Snake On Saturn's Moon Confirmed
Oh my god! A new MGS Game!
This was predicted by Nostrodamus. KISS played a song in praise of it: here.
On news today that the surface of saturn is literally covered in a sea of liquid ethane, a combined oil conglomerate of Exxon and Mobil Oil Corp. have announced that they are exploring "pipeline options" to tap into the limitless reserves.
"Screw the tree hugging liberals" said one un-identified spokesman. "If we can gain access to such a limitless source of fuel for automobiles, we won't have to waste a dime on alternatives. 60 year supply? How about 6000 year supply."
In other news, the price per barrel of oil has dropped $26.00 per barrel on chinese market trading. John Vaderslooth of Bears Sterns this morning said "I wouldn't be surpised to see us drop ack down into the $50-60.00 per barrel range by close today." It should be an exciting market day today.
Back to you taco.
Armaments, 2-9-21 And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, 'O Lord, bless this Thy hand grenade' N
The actual confirmation was a big ripple when a rock fell into the lake.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
"the energy costs alone would be astronomical" ba dum tis
One last thing: Sometimes I wonder; "Is that someone's signature? Or do they type that at the end of each post?"
This is the official official thread. All other threads should post under this one if they want to be official. Please post here to avoid contaminating the jokes with non-funny comments.
Thank you and good day sirs!
[signature]
What makes me wonder is what these pools of hydrocarbons on Titan say about 'debunked' theory of abiogenic oil.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_petroleum_origin
For those not familiar with Ethane, it has a boiling point of -86.6 degrees Celsius. Interesting that a moon has cycles in the neighborhood of that temperature range. Though a trip there would make most parts of Antarctica seem like a tropical reprieve.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The first manned mission to Titan ended tragically today as one of the astronauts stepped out onto the surface and lit up a cigarette.
sgt: Ok, men, wax your boards and hit the surf.
pvt: Hey, do you think it's safe?
sgt: Don't worry, Geeblort don't surf!
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
I thought we've always had beaten into our heads that hydrocarbons, and oil and gas in particular were the result of decaying biomass from dinosaurs. So, where did these hydrocarbons come from? Was Titan an outpost for some spacefaring dino species, that got wiped out in a strange intergalactic plague? Or is there a much more sane, reasonable answer that I just haven't seen yet?
A consortium of Exxon/Shell/BP/Haliburton have formed the Hydrocarbon Orbital Recovery - Exterra Partners, know as HORE Partners, to being planning for recover of the Titan resources.
The whole "USA invade SATuRn for OiL" thing gets tiring after a while. What are the real chances of a form of life on Titan?
According to TFA the lakes seem to be a mixture of ethane, methane and other hydrocarbons. From what I've read, he general consensus is that life requires a liquid solvent that can dissolve a vast amount of materials, such as water or ammonia. It seems that ammonia ices and water ices have been ruled out on the surface, leaving only the frozen and non frozen areas of hydrocarbons.
Given that the ethane is a byproduct of methane breakdown by sunlight on Titan, also producing the chemical haze of its atmostphere, would there be any chance of a life form developing in Titan's lakes? The chemistry seems to be low on energy for life to start, but the same chemistry is also highly reactive.
Anyone?
Actually, the energy associated with Saturn's orbit is greater than Earth's. Look at the rotational energy of two objects with the same mass, but give one Saturn's orbital distance and speed and one Earth's. You actually gain energy coming to Earth.
Think about electron orbitals...it's kinda the same...higher orbits = more energy. Or you can think of an ice skater, when she bring her hands in, she spins faster. It is conservation of momentum not speed.
One last thing: Sometimes I wonder; "Is that someone's signature? Or do they type that at the end of each post?"
TFA:
The lake is roughly 20,000 square miles (7,800 square miles) in area
I see that the good folks at NASA still haven't quite got the hang of it.
Way to be all snarky! you can't even spell!! idiot!
On reread of my post, I caught my spelling error and it also seems to have a negative tone. I was going for funny with the heading, not condescending. I think I missed the mark. Haha, oh well, jokes on me, not knowing how to spell and all.
One last thing: Sometimes I wonder; "Is that someone's signature? Or do they type that at the end of each post?"
You are barking up the wrong tree. The potential energy gains will take care of the acceleration.
The problems of delivering the goods to Earth are different: (1) exiting Titan's gravity well, (2) exiting Saturn's gravity well, (3) decelerating from Saturn's orbital speed, (4) waiting for the Sun to pull the vehicle in, (5) decelerating onto Earth's orbit and (6) landing on Earth.
Step (4) will bring the vehicle to the speed of 40 km/s so a deceleration of 10 km/s will be needed.
I remember a teenage SF story (back in the 50's) that had colonists on Titan. They flew around in cute little jet aircraft; only needed to carry an oxidizer (oxygen), since the atmosphere was methane.
I always thought that interesting; fanciful but interesting.
Don' free teh Titans. Perseus is dead.
I drank what? -- Socrates
All the articles mention ethane being the product of methane "broken" by sunlight, it is actually methane CH4 having it's H knocked away by a sunlight reaction to make a methyl CH3 radical and joining with another CH3 to make ethane C2H6. I guess you can call that "broken" into ethane.
Given that the above reaction has a byproduct of H*, I guess there is an open question if it can somehow combine with the Nitrogen. For example, if you have some natural process of natural Nitrogen fixation (breaking the triple bond of N2 so it could be combined with H), it seems to me that there is at least some chance of life. Unfortunatly, at a very low temperature, this seems like it would be tough to do. But if you had a way to make ammonia (maybe lightning?), then it seems mightly likely that something could use this highly energetic molecule as a basis for life. Other than that, it seem like it's mostly a hydrocarbon stew...
Many folks think that simple, but highly energetic molecules like ammonia are needed for life. This is basically because it seems hard to evolve in an environment where free uncontrolled energy (like direct ultraviolet light which is what is making all that ethane from methane) is probably tearing down any molecules (like protiens or dna) which proto-life is carefully putting together, so you likely need a small molecule to transfer/store energy from where it is collected to somewhere more protected where you can use it to make more complicated molecules. Of course many folks could be wrong and something else might work just as well.
"seem to confirm that observations really do show..."
Yeah. You sound convinced!
On soviet Titan, the planet orbits you.
If you do what you always did, you get what you always got.
I want Photos in HD!
Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.
This may answer some of your questions.
http://www.amazon.com/Deep-Hot-Biosphere-Fossil-Fuels/dp/0387952535
All these dangerous gases! We need to help Al Gore clean up these moons! TAX THE CORPORATIONS!
I think one theory is that he originally picked 12 - a number that humans seem to like.
So nobody is certain exactly where he pulled some of the numbers from to define his scale? Sounds pretty much like the definition of nonsensical to me!
No, Venus's surface is a desert.
In that it doesn't have any water. However it does rain pure liquid sulphuric acid from time to time
George Bush: What the hell are these hydrocarbons on Titan people keep talking about?!
Advisor: It's kinda like oil, Mr. President.
*Bush-head emits cash-register-sound and a not so bright lightbulb appears above*
If you quote this signature there'll be 72 copies of Windows ME waiting for you in Heaven.
12 - a number that humans seem to like
No. Humans hate it. But they hate non-integer numbers more. So 12 is damn useful. You can divide it by 2, 3, 4 and 6!
60 is useful for the same reason. You can divide it by 2, 3, 4, 5(giving you 12), 6, 10, 12, 15 and 30!
Compare that with 10, which you can only divide by 2 and 5.
If you only want to deal with integers, 12 and 60 are very practical bases.
Somebody needs to tell Boon Pickens about this one. Great source of motor fuel if we ever need it.
Do you think we will ever want to go into space? I think people are too busy here killing each other. There are all these secret government projects to reduce population.