Spacecraft Spots Probable Waves On Titan's Seas

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Spacecraft Spots Probable Waves On Titan's Seas

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday December 16, 2014 @08:36PM from the surf's-up dept.

sciencehabit writes: It's springtime on Titan, Saturn's giant and frigid moon, and the action on its hydrocarbon seas seems to be heating up. Near the moon's north pole, there is growing evidence for waves on three different seas, scientists reported at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Researchers are also coming up with the first estimates for the volume and composition of the seas. The bodies of water appear to be made mostly of methane, and not mostly ethane as previously thought. And they are deep: Ligeia Mare, the second biggest sea with an area larger than Lake Superior, could contain 55 times Earth's oil reserves.

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does not compute by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-16 20:40 · Score: 5, Insightful

bodies of water made of methane?
1. Re:does not compute by michelcolman · 2014-12-17 00:50 · Score: 1
  
  Water is H2O, methane is CH4. You can certainly have seas of methane on Titan, but they are not "bodies of water".
2. Re:does not compute by operagost · 2014-12-17 02:25 · Score: 1
  
  Where does it say "bodies of water"? It says "hydrocarbon seas" in both the summary and the article. I am stumped as to why you were modded up.
  
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3. Re:does not compute by Jason+Levine · 2014-12-17 02:32 · Score: 2
  
  To be fair, the Slashdot summary does say "bodies of water":
  
  The bodies of water appear to be made mostly of methane, and not mostly ethane as previously thought.
  (Emphasis mine.)
  
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  My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
4. Re:does not compute by jlv · 2014-12-17 02:38 · Score: 1
  
  To be even more fair, the Slashdot summary is the first paragraph of the article. The dumb line comes straight from the article.
5. Re:does not compute by operagost · 2014-12-17 02:41 · Score: 1
  
  Oops, now I found it. I guess I just gave away how I'll bail out of the summary halfway through to go read the article.
  
  --
  
  Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
6. Re:does not compute by Charliemopps · 2014-12-17 02:45 · Score: 2
  
  Umm, this is not the methane you simple person know; or think you know. For one thing, temperatures on Titan are somewhat different than that on Earth, so please try again to recompute what you once thought you knew. Seas of frozen methane do exist, take Titan for example.
  He's just being pedantic about a phrase in the summary.
  
  The bodies of water appear to be made mostly of methane, and not mostly ethane as previously thought.
  A "Body of water" can't be made of methane.
  Not that it matters. People like to post stuff like this AC and then mod themselves up... so they get to post AND mod in the same thread. I wish they'd just stop allowing AC posts to get modded, but oh well...
7. Re:does not compute by blackomegax · 2014-12-17 02:55 · Score: 1
  
  "The bodies of water appear to be made mostly of methane, and not mostly ethane as previously thought."
8. Re:does not compute by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-17 08:46 · Score: 1
  
  I wish they'd just stop allowing AC posts to get modded, but oh well...
  Would be awfully convenient for you considering how often you've been wrong and have had AC posts correcting what you said because there seem to be people knowledgeable in several sciences fields around here posting as AC...
With so much hydrocarbons by Spy+Handler · 2014-12-16 20:42 · Score: 1

climate change must be rampant over there.
1. Re:With so much hydrocarbons by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-16 20:55 · Score: 1
  
  Well, not much change, but according to wikipedia:
  "Atmospheric methane creates a greenhouse effect on Titan's surface, without which Titan would be far colder.[55] Conversely, haze in Titan's atmosphere contributes to an anti-greenhouse effect by reflecting sunlight back into space, cancelling a portion of the greenhouse effect and making its surface significantly colder than its upper atmosphere.[56]"
2. Re:With so much hydrocarbons by darkain · 2014-12-16 21:21 · Score: 1
  
  And that same theory applied here on Earth: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G...
3. Re:With so much hydrocarbons by itzly · 2014-12-17 08:01 · Score: 1
  
  If the amount is constant, climate wouldn't change.
Titan needs some freedom and democracy, me thinks. by Emmi59 · 2014-12-16 20:54 · Score: 1

Time to take action, Mr. Obama!
yeah right by Neil+Boekend · 2014-12-16 21:12 · Score: 5, Funny

The bodies of water appear to be made mostly of methane,

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Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
1. Re:yeah right by Edis+Krad · 2014-12-16 22:44 · Score: 1
  
  What? We have those on earth too!
2. Re:yeah right by Mister+Transistor · 2014-12-16 23:00 · Score: 1
  
  Also what makes them think there's oil there? Would that not have required having life there that died and rotted away and got buried for centuries??
  
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  -- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
3. Re:yeah right by Rei · 2014-12-16 23:55 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  They worded it poorly, as the seas are methane, which is not oil - on earth it's the prime component of natural gas, so the better term would simply be "hydrocarbons". That said, hydrocarbons do not need life to form - just hydrogen, carbon, and a shortage of any oxidizers that could break them down into the lower energy states of H2O and CO2. Even longer chain hydrocarbons can form naturally - on Titan, that happens in the upper atmosphere by photochemical reactions.
  It's important not to overgeneralize Earth to other celestial bodies. For example, you can even have bodies with oxygen atmospheres without life. We see this (to a tiny extent) on Europa, which has an extremely thin oxygen atmosphere from photolysis of water ice. It's quite possible that in other systems there could be an environment that produces a denser O2 atmosphere through a similar process - or through other processes, both known or not yet conceived of.
  The universe is a weird place. Think about what a tidally locked rocky planet orbiting close to its parent star would experience. I read about one planet whose night side temperature was expected to be earthlike but with a hot side temperature of thousands of degrees. So think about it for a second, what's going to happen? The hot side is going to constantly boil off, potentially even to plasma, be circulated around to the cold side, and then rain down rock. Rockstorms. Depending on the properties of the rock, the rate of boil-off, the rate of redistribution, and the properties of the atmosphere, it could be anywhere from dust to large chunks, and anything from volcanic-like ash to pele's hair (rock wool) to breccias to gemstones. Lightning would be tremendous, like in some volcanic eruptions. Given the amount of energy at hand, winds in storms could get up to ridiculous intensities. The redistribution of mass is going to cause a continual planetary slump from the cold side to the hot side, so one would expect frequent, super-intense earthquakes and frequent volcanic eruptions. You might get some intense magnetic effects via an exceptionally strong dynamo effect, plus the star's magnetic field itself would be orders of magnitude stronger. Aurora could be intense enough to light the sky on the cold side and power photosynthesis. Aurora could be intense enough to light the sky and power photosynthesis on the cold side. Liquid water would be stable in certain places (if it managed not to be all blown off over geological timescales, that is, the planet would have to be large), but would be thrashed about to biblical extends by the other aforementioned processes. If the magnetic fields are strong enough, flowing saltwater may even be visibly dragged by Lorentz forces and build up charges when constrained. The dissociation of the rock on the hot side would free up oxygen into the atmosphere, which would not be all immediately consumed on the cold side (some oxidation reactions are slow). And on and on. So it's potentially possible to have livable, breathable planet with a soil made from regular rains of rock wool and gemstones, lit by aurorae and in a constantly undergoing one catastrophe after the next.
  
  --
  "We consider that six courts and an asylum claim are a rather odd way of returning to Sweden within a month."
4. Re:yeah right by invid · 2014-12-17 01:59 · Score: 1
  
  Some people incorrectly believe "water" is a synonym of "liquid".
  
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  The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
5. Re:yeah right by Mister+Transistor · 2014-12-17 03:02 · Score: 1
  
  OK, that makes more sense - thank you. Then again, what did I expect from an article with "lakes of water that is methane"? I am a fan of exoplanetary research, so I am familiar with most of what you said. However, the "full of oil" came out of left field and threw me momentarily...
  
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  -- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Is Titan slowly drying off? by Viol8 · 2014-12-16 21:29 · Score: 1

The liquid only appear at the poles even though the entire moon is covered with liquid carved features, so I'm wondering if Titan is an even more frigid version of Mars with all the liquid slowly evaporating away over the eons and escaping from the atmosphere, and maybe in another few hundred million years or so will be bone dry.
1. Re:Is Titan slowly drying off? by Rei · 2014-12-17 00:06 · Score: 1
  
  Probably not, but the hydrocarbon cycle on Titan is still very poorly understood. I really look forward to the next Titan mission, but unfortunately everyone's obsessed with Europa so the next launch window is almost certainly going to be missed and it'll be decades before a new spacecraft gets there. The presence of seas and the low gravity plus a dense atmosphere leaves one with a plethora of great exploration options (all nuclear powered, of course, there's essentially no sunlight): hydrogen blimp (it's noncombustible on Titan) (with or without propulsion), hot air or hot hydrogen blimp (it takes surprisingly little heat there to get lift), hybrid blimp / lifting body aircraft, helicopter, fixed wing aircraft, tilt wing aircraft, boat, hybrid aircraft / boat (with any other aircraft design), etc.
  My favorite design (although probably the most expensive) would be a tilt wing aircraft with floating landing gear for either surface or sea landings. You get the high speed travel and freedom of motion of a fixed wing aircraft so you can cover the whole planet, but you can land anywhere, do science for a day or so while you recharge your flight batteries (so you don't need a huge RTG or reactor), then take off again for the next location. The view from the air (whether optical or radar) of the previous day's hop would be used by the ground team to figure out where to have it go for the next day.
  
  --
  "We consider that six courts and an asylum claim are a rather odd way of returning to Sweden within a month."
Tomorrow's news by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-16 21:31 · Score: 1

USA starts war on Titan (to liberate its aliens from their evil totalitarian dictator)
1. Re:Tomorrow's news by The+Grim+Reefer · 2014-12-17 01:05 · Score: 1
  
  USA starts war on Titan (to liberate its aliens from their evil totalitarian dictator)
  Charlie don't surf!
2. Re:Tomorrow's news by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-17 01:05 · Score: 1
  
  This is only the 5,000th time I've heard this joke.
3. Re:Tomorrow's news by Applehu+Akbar · 2014-12-17 02:40 · Score: 1
  
  No, our argument is that Titanian hydrocarbons will be used locally, to support development of the asteroid belt. Asteroids appear to be rich in metals, but have no hydrocarbons that we can currently detect. Everything we eat is made of hydrocarbons, so we're going to need them.
4. Re:Tomorrow's news by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-17 04:11 · Score: 1
  
  The asteroid belt is not local to titan, and in fact any point on the asteroid belt is closer to Earth than Saturn, regardless of their orbital positions. Hydrocarbons have been found asteroids a long time ago, as some have a decent carbon content, along with more complex carbon compounds. Nothing we eat is made of hydrocarbons, as at the very least you need some oxygen in there.
5. Re:Tomorrow's news by Applehu+Akbar · 2014-12-17 04:31 · Score: 1
  
  In space, closeness is defined by the cost of lifting from gravity wells, not just distance. in terms of cost and gravity wells. If we do find highly carbonaceous asteroids, that would be even better.
6. Re:Tomorrow's news by Applehu+Akbar · 2014-12-18 03:22 · Score: 1
  
  Saturn's gravity well is certainly a factor, but you need to compare lift from Titan to lift from Earth itself, not from Earth orbit. There are no hydrocarbons in Earth orbit.
Springtime on Titan by hughbar · 2014-12-16 21:50 · Score: 1

Autumn for Pluto and Uranus.

Sorry, even at 64 years old, I couldn't resist that.

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On y va, qui mal y pense!
1. Re:Springtime on Titan by jlv · 2014-12-17 03:15 · Score: 1
  
  Shouldn't that be "Winter for Pluto and Uranus"?
2. Re:Springtime on Titan by sconeu · 2014-12-17 05:10 · Score: 1
  
  [PRODUCERS]
  It's Springtime
  For Titan
  And Jupiter!!
  Saturn is happy, and gay!
  [/PRODUCERS]
  
  --
  General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
3. Re:Springtime on Titan by hughbar · 2014-12-17 08:31 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, sorry, over enthusiastic about the whole concept and I should have checked! Thanks!
  
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  On y va, qui mal y pense!
Oil Reserves. by Nyder · 2014-12-16 23:18 · Score: 5, Interesting

I like how the body of water is measured in "Oil Reserves". Not gallons, not compared to any oceans or seas, or land mass, but "Oil Reserves"
Wonder who owns that media...

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Be seeing you...
1. Re:Oil Reserves. by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-17 00:53 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  FTFS:
  
  It's springtime on Titan
  I'm wondering how it is springtime on the whole moon at once.
2. Re:Oil Reserves. by Waffle+Iron · 2014-12-17 07:14 · Score: 1
  
  I like how the body of water is measured in "Oil Reserves".
  It's a body of methane, not water, and it is chemically much more closely related to oil than water. So it arguably makes more sense to compare it to the amount of oil on earth than to the amount of water.
Methane != Oil by packrat0x · 2014-12-16 23:25 · Score: 2

made mostly of methane

And they are deep: Ligeia Mare, the second biggest sea with an area larger than Lake Superior, could contain 55 times Earth's oil reserves.

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227-3517
Re:RUBBLES FOR SALE !! GET YOUR RUBBLES !! by Rei · 2014-12-16 23:56 · Score: 1

I'll take a truckload, I need something to insulate my house with.

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"We consider that six courts and an asylum claim are a rather odd way of returning to Sweden within a month."
Cautious? by Rei · 2014-12-17 00:12 · Score: 1

Scientists involved in the discoveries have been cautious, saying that the features could also be floating debris or bubbles
Um, wouldn't those things be even more awesome? Trust me, I won't be disappointed if there's geological activity causing bubbling from under the seas (heat plus organics!), or if there's floating objects (cryopumice / super fluffy snow? organics foams? something else? what the heck floats on methane, after all?)

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"We consider that six courts and an asylum claim are a rather odd way of returning to Sweden within a month."
1. Re:Cautious? by Rei · 2014-12-17 07:44 · Score: 1
  
  And examples of these which could plausibly be on Titan are....?
  There's not much in nature that's that light.
  
  --
  "We consider that six courts and an asylum claim are a rather odd way of returning to Sweden within a month."
Not /. - that's TFA and science journalism by bradley13 · 2014-12-17 00:54 · Score: 1

That idiotic quote comes straight from TFA. It amply demonstrates the quality of what passes for "science journalism". In this case, not only the author, but also the editors of ScienceMag give the impression that they think methane is some weird form of water.
Actually, the author not only thinks that methane is water, he simultaneously thinks that it is oil, because he also writes that one of the methane seas "could contain 55 times Earth's oil reserves". Alternatively, he may be mixing information from unrelated theories: previously, the absence of waves was taken to indicate that the seas were viscous, containing heavier hydrocarbons. Reality could be somewhere between the two extremes.
Regardless, TFA is poor journalism, bringing more confusion than enlightenment to the average reader...

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Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
China builds an island by jfdavis668 · 2014-12-17 01:18 · Score: 1

China is planning on building an island in the middle of this sea to back a future ownership claim.
World Energy Crisis by Cassini2 · 2014-12-17 02:51 · Score: 1

All that fuel to burn on Titan, and no air ...
The perfect inter-planetary refueling depot, and no oxidizer ...
What to do???
Re:Titan needs some freedom and democracy, me thin by blackomegax · 2014-12-17 03:01 · Score: 1

One part was, you blamed bush-era CIA torture on Obama, who merely 'didn't prosecute' the matter (still wrong...but far less guilty than you paint.).
wait for it.. lame WMD joke engaged! by rogoshen1 · 2014-12-17 05:43 · Score: 1

Next up: Spacecraft finds weapons of mass destruction on Titan
Re:Titan needs some freedom and democracy, me thin by Mister+Transistor · 2014-12-17 08:50 · Score: 1

Awww, you're so cute when you're trying to act all grown up like that.
I'll name one thing wrong - you posted at all. People like you do nothing but exacerbate problems. You take a joke and turn it into seething political flamebait, spewing the Fox News Greatest Hits soundbytes as you go. Do you think YOU added anything but bile and hate to the conversation? It was about astronomy, in case you forgot and were distracted by your own stupid, unnecessary commentary.
Spare us next time you get the urge to post, and just fuck off, AC troll.

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They have WMD's we should invade by RandomAdam · 2014-12-17 14:35 · Score: 1

...to liberate the oppressed locals

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@Random_Adam

Sometimes a sig doesn't have to be funny!!
Probable waves? by Askmum · 2014-12-17 19:49 · Score: 1

Are these used to power the infinite improbability drive? How probable are these waves?