Ammonia is responsible for resurfacing Titan

[rlb2]

<font color="orange">Scientists can infer from Cassini-Huygens results that Titan has ammonia, said Jonathan I. Lunine, an interdisciplinary scientist for the European Space Agency's Huygens probe that landed on Titan last month. <br /><br />He predicts that Cassini instruments will find that Titan has a liquid ammonia-and-water layer beneath its hard, water-ice surface. Cassini will see -- Cassini radar has likely already seen -- places where liquid ammonia-and-water slurry erupted from extremely cold volcanoes and flowed across Titan's landscape. Ammonia in the thick mixture released in this way, called "cryovolcanism," could be the source of molecular nitrogen, the major gas in Titan's atmosphere. <br /><br />"I think what's clear from the data is that Titan has accreted or acquired significant amounts of ammonia, as well as water," Lunine said. "If ammonia is present, it may be responsible for resurfacing significant parts of Titan."<br /> <br />Cassini radar imaged a feature that resembles a basaltic flow on Earth when it made its first close pass by Titan in October 2004. Scientists believe that Titan has a rock core, surrounded by an overlying layer of rock-hard water ice. Ammonia in Titan's volcanic fluid would lower the freezing point of water, lower the fluid's density so it would be about as buoyant as water ice, and increase viscosity to about that of basalt, Lunine said. "The feature seen in the radar data suggests ammonia is at work on Titan in cryovolcanism." <br /><br />Titan's eccentric, rather than circular, orbit can be explained by the moon's subsurface liquid layer, Lunine said. Gabriel Tobie of the University of Nantes (France), Lunine and others will publish an article about it in a forthcoming issue of Icarus.<br /><br />http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=16193<br /><br /></font> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Ron Bennett </div>

 

[rogers_buck]

Gee, some day colonists might open their doors and windows so that their kitchens can be cleaned by a genuine white tornado.

 

[rlb2]

<font color="orange">Gee, some day colonists might open their doors and windows so that their kitchens can be cleaned by a genuine white tornado.<font color="white"> <br /><br />Ha. <br /><br />Just think Titan is a self cleaning and deodorizing compost bin.<br /></font></font> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Ron Bennett </div>

 

[CalliArcale]

*groans*<br /><br />Fascinating speculation, however. Ammonia-driven cryovolcanism. Very very cool! <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[rlb2]

<font color="orange">Ammonia-driven cryovolcanism.<font color="white"><br /><br />One amazing thing about Titan is that we could well be looking at primordial Earth frozen in time.<br /></font></font> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Ron Bennett </div>