{"id":9654,"date":"2015-01-15T11:19:59","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T16:19:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=9654"},"modified":"2015-01-15T11:19:59","modified_gmt":"2015-01-15T16:19:59","slug":"ten-years-since-cassini-deployed-huygens-to-land-on-titan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=9654","title":{"rendered":"Ten years since Cassini deployed Huygens to land on Titan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>NASA and ESA\u00a0mark the 10th\u00a0anniversary of the landing of the Huygens probe onto Saturn&#8217;s moon Titan:<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.jpl.nasa.gov\/news\/news.php?feature=4442\" target=\"_d\">NASA and ESA Celebrate 10 Years Since Titan Landing<\/a><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"1600\" height=\"900\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TMxL3ZhO8A8?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Ten years ago, an explorer from Earth parachuted into the haze of an alien moon toward an uncertain fate. After a gentle descent lasting more than two hours, it landed with a thud on a frigid floodplain, surrounded by icy cobblestones. With this feat, the Huygens probe accomplished humanity&#8217;s first landing on a moon in the outer solar system. Huygens was safely on Titan, the largest moon of Saturn.<\/p>\n<p>The hardy probe not only survived the descent and landing, but continued to transmit data for more than an hour on the frigid surface of Titan, until its batteries were drained.<\/p>\n<p>Since that historic moment, scientists from around the world have pored over volumes of data about Titan, sent to Earth by Huygens &#8212; a project of the European Space Agency &#8212; and its mothership, NASA&#8217;s Cassini spacecraft. In the past 10 years, data from the dynamic spacecraft duo have revealed many details of a surprisingly Earth-like world.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the technical wizardry needed to pull off this tour de force, international partnerships were critical to successfully delivering the two spacecraft to Saturn and Titan.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;A mission of this ambitious scale represents a triumph in international collaboration,&#8221; said Earl Maize, Cassini Project manager at NASA&#8217;s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;From the mission&#8217;s formal beginning in 1982, to Huygens&#8217; spectacular landing 23 years later, to the present day, Cassini-Huygens owes much of its success to the tremendous synergy and cooperation between more than a dozen countries. This teamwork is still a major strength of the project as the Cassini orbiter continues to explore the Saturn system,&#8221; Maize said.<\/p>\n<p>A gallery of some of the best images related to Huygens is available at:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/saturn.jpl.nasa.gov\/news\/cassinifeatures\/huygens10\">http:\/\/saturn.jpl.nasa.gov\/news\/cassinifeatures\/huygens10<\/a><\/p>\n<p>A collection of Huygens&#8217; top findings is available from the European Space Agency at:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/sci.esa.int\/huygens-titan-science-highlights\">http:\/\/sci.esa.int\/huygens-titan-science-highlights<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Cassini&#8217;s mission is slated to continue through September 2017.<\/p>\n<p>______________________________________________________________<\/p>\n<p><b>Science Summary: 10 Years of Unveiling Titan<\/b><\/p>\n<p>A decade ago, Titan was known as a hidden, hazy world. Findings made by NASA&#8217;s Cassini mission and the European Space Agency&#8217;s Huygens probe have unveiled Titan as an &#8220;alien Earth,&#8221; providing scientists with a unique world to explore.<\/p>\n<p>A sampling of the top discoveries at Titan includes:<\/p>\n<p><b>Lakes and Seas<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Titan is a world with lakes and seas, made up of liquid methane and ethane. It is believed that these bodies of hydrocarbons are replenished by methane and ethane rainfall from clouds in the moon&#8217;s atmosphere. Titan is the only other place in the solar system known to have an Earth-like cycle of liquids flowing across its surface.<\/p>\n<p><b>Active Meteorology and Surface Processes<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Liquid methane drizzles onto Titan&#8217;s surface. Just like clouds on Earth, clouds on Titan form through a cycle of evaporation and condensation, with methane vapor rising from the surface, forming clouds and falling back down as precipitation. Huygens data suggest the presence of layered methane clouds in Titan&#8217;s troposphere, at altitudes between about 5 and 20 miles (8 and 30 kilometers). Titan&#8217;s &#8220;hydrological&#8221; cycle causes visible changes on the moon&#8217;s surface.<\/p>\n<p><b>Organic Sand Seas<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Seas of sand dunes, like those in Earth&#8217;s Arabian desert, are observed in the dark equatorial regions of Titan. Scientists believe the sand is not made of silicates as on Earth, but of solid water ice coated with hydrocarbons that fall from the atmosphere. Images show Titan&#8217;s dunes are gigantic, reaching, on average, 0.6 to 1.2 miles (1 to 2 kilometers) wide, hundreds of miles (kilometers) long and around 300 feet (100 meters) high.<\/p>\n<p>The location of the Huygens probe&#8217;s resting place, a soft, sandy riverbed, was only confirmed after some time by the detection of two dark, longitudinal sand dunes, about 20 miles (30 kilometers) north of the landing site. The elusive landforms were visible in images from both Cassini radar and the probe.<\/p>\n<p><b>First Determination of Depth for an Extraterrestrial Sea<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Ligeia Mare, Titan&#8217;s second-largest sea, was revealed to be about 560 feet (170 meters) deep. This represents the first time scientists have been able to determine the depth of a body of open liquid on the surface of another world. This was possible, in part, because the liquid turned out to be mostly clear methane, allowing the radar signal to pass through it easily.<\/p>\n<p><b>River Channels and Ice Cobbles<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Images taken during the Huygens probe&#8217;s descent revealed river channels and flood plains. The probe&#8217;s cameras unveiled a plateau with a large number of dark channels cut into it, forming drainage networks that bore many similarities to those on Earth. The narrow channels converged into broad rivers, which drained into a broad, dark, lowland region. Earth-like river rocks, composed of water ice, were also observed at the Huygens probe landing site. Radar evidence from Cassini suggests that flash flooding has sculpted streambeds on Titan with these rounded cobbles of water ice, which likely originated in water-ice bedrock in higher terrain.<\/p>\n<p><b>The Collapse of the Detached Haze<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The massive atmosphere of Titan is shrouded in thick layers of photochemical smog. One of the &#8220;detached&#8221; layers has fallen in altitude from over 310 miles to only 240 miles (about 500 kilometers to only 380 kilometers) between 2006 and 2010. The changing altitudes indicate that Titan&#8217;s smog layers are coupled to a seasonal climate cycle.<\/p>\n<p><b>Rich Chemistry in the Atmosphere, including Propylene<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The Huygens probe made the first direct measurements of Titan&#8217;s lower atmosphere. Data returned by the probe included altitude profiles of the gaseous constituents, isotopic ratios and trace gases (including organic compounds). Huygens also directly sampled aerosols in the atmosphere and confirmed that carbon and nitrogen are their major constituents. Cassini detected propylene, a chemical used to make household plastic, in Titan&#8217;s atmosphere. This is the first definitive detection of the plastic ingredients on any moon or planet, other than Earth. Other chemicals observed indicate a rich and complex chemistry originating from methane and nitrogen and evolving into complex molecules, eventually forming the smog that surrounds the icy moon.<\/p>\n<p><b>Argon-40 Isotope in the Atmosphere<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Huygens&#8217; detection of Argon-40, an isotope or type of the element argon, in Titan&#8217;s atmosphere indicates that the interior of Titan is still active. This is unusual in a moon and one of the first clues of subsurface liquid water on Titan. The presence of the Huygens probe on Titan&#8217;s surface was essential in detecting this substance, as it is mostly concentrated toward the bottom of the atmosphere (due to its relatively heavier weight compared to the lighter molecules comprising the atmosphere).<\/p>\n<p><b>Liquid Water Subsurface Ocean<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Cassini&#8217;s numerous gravity measurements of Titan revealed that this moon is hiding an internal, liquid water\/ammonia ocean underneath its surface. Huygens also detected radio signals during its descent that strongly suggested the presence of an ocean 35 to 50 miles (55 to 80 kilometers) below the moon&#8217;s surface. The discovery of a global ocean of liquid water adds Titan to the handful of worlds in our solar system that could potentially contain habitable environments.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-<\/p>\n<p>The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA&#8217;s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA&#8217;s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. JPL designed, developed and assembled the Cassini orbiter. NASA supplied two instruments on the Huygens probe, the Descent Imager\/Spectral Radiometer and the Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer.<\/p>\n<p>More information about Cassini is available at the following sites:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/cassini\">http:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/cassini<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/saturn.jpl.nasa.gov\/\">http:\/\/saturn.jpl.nasa.gov<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NASA and ESA\u00a0mark the 10th\u00a0anniversary of the landing of the Huygens probe onto Saturn&#8217;s moon Titan: NASA and ESA Celebrate 10 Years Since Titan Landing Ten years ago, an explorer from Earth parachuted into the haze of an alien moon toward an uncertain fate. After a gentle descent lasting more than two hours, it landed &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=9654\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Ten years since Cassini deployed Huygens to land on Titan<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98,87,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-titan","category-et-al","category-space-science"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p34aWK-2vI","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13740,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=13740","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":0},"title":"Video: Ride ESA&#8217;s Huygens probe as it descends down to the surface of Saturn&#8217;s moon Titan","author":"TopSpacer","date":"January 12, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"A new video provides a wonderfully vivid view of the descent 12 years ago of the\u00a0Huygens Probe\u00a0onto the surface of Saturn's moon Titan using the actual images that were transmitted back to Earth via the Cassini spacecraft:\u00a0Cassini: Mission to Saturn: Huygens: 'Ground Truth' from an Alien Moon On Jan. 14,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=98"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/msiLWxDayuA\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":14753,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=14753","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":1},"title":"Video: &#8220;A World Unveiled: Cassini at Titan&#8221;","author":"TopSpacer","date":"August 13, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Cassini-Huygens mission\u00a0ends\u00a0on September 15th when the Cassini spacecraft will plunge into Saturn's atmosphere. Looking back on the 13 years of exploring the Saturn system, the discoveries about Titan, on which the Huygens probe landed, were among the richest of the whole program:\u00a0Cassini: The Grand Finale: Cassini Prepares to Say\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=98"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/7722_MAIN__PIA21624_Titan_-_RGB_-_CB3-RED-GRN-BL1_-_March_21_2017_-_21-1024x518.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8188,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=8188","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":2},"title":"Video: Cassini arrives at Saturn","author":"TopSpacer","date":"June 26, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"On June 30th\u00a0it will be 10 years since the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft, built by a US\/Europe collaboration,\u00a0went into orbit around\u00a0Saturn. Huygens successfully landed on the moon Titan in 2005 and Cassini has continued to provide tremendous information and imagery of Saturn, its rings and moons. \u00a0Here is a NASA video about\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=87"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/s8sNsmkXb8M\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":14032,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=14032","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":3},"title":"Cassini reveals odd shape of Saturn&#8217;s moon Pan","author":"TopSpacer","date":"March 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Cassini probe at Saturn continues to return fabulous images. The latest photos show closeups of the tiny moon Pan: Cassini Reveals Strange Shape of Saturn's Moon Pan\u00a0 These raw, unprocessed images of Saturn's tiny moon, Pan, were taken on March 7, 2017, by NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The flyby had\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=98"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/2_n1867602424_11.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":14347,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=14347","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":4},"title":"Cassini: Cloud bands streak across Saturn&#8217;s moon Titan","author":"TopSpacer","date":"May 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"More good stuff from Cassini as it nears its Grand Finale. Cassini: The Grand Finale: Cloud Bands Streak Across Titan\u00a0 May 9, 2017: NASA's Cassini spacecraft captured this view of bands of bright, feathery methane clouds drifting across Saturn's moon Titan on May 7, 2017. The view was obtained during\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Europa, Titan, &amp; other deep space sites","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=98"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/7673_PIA21450-A-and-B-1000w1.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5657,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=5657","url_meta":{"origin":9654,"position":5},"title":"Video: Soaring over Titan","author":"TopSpacer","date":"December 13, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This video will take you \"Soaring Over Titan: Extraterrestrial Land of Lakes\": http:\/\/youtu.be\/RrGPtCdItBw Caption: This colorized movie from NASA's Cassini mission takes viewers over the largest seas and lakes on Saturn's moon Titan. The movie is made from radar data received during multiple flyovers of Titan from 2004 to 2013.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=87"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/RrGPtCdItBw\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9654"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9654\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9655,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9654\/revisions\/9655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}