Skip to content
Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Primary Menu Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

  • Home
  • Newswires
  • Politics & Society
  • The New Feudals
  • World View
  • Arts And Aesthetics
  • For The Record
  • About Us
  • Featured
  • Politics & Society

‘Possibility Of Life’: Scientists Map Saturn’s Exotic Moon Titan

Nov 19, 2019 | Pratirodh Bureau

FILE PHOTO: This artist's concept envisions what hydrocarbon ice forming on a liquid hydrocarbon sea of Saturn's moon Titan might look like in this NASA image released on January 8, 2013

Scientists on Monday unveiled the first global geological map of Saturn’s moon Titan, including vast plains and dunes of frozen organic material and lakes of liquid methane, illuminating an exotic world considered a strong candidate in the search for life beyond Earth.

The map was based on radar, infrared and other data collected by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which studied Saturn and its moons from 2004 to 2017. Titan, with a diameter of 3,200 miles (5,150 km), is the solar system’s second-biggest moon behind Jupiter’s Ganymede. It is larger than the planet Mercury.

Organic materials – carbon-based compounds critical for fostering living organisms – play a leading role on Titan.

“Organics are very important for the possibility of life on Titan, which many of us think likely would have evolved in the liquid water ocean under Titan’s icy crust,” said planetary geologist Rosaly Lopes of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

“Organic materials can, we think, penetrate down to the liquid water ocean and this can provide nutrients necessary for life, if it evolved there,” added Lopes, who led the research published in the journal Nature Astronomy.

On Earth, water rains down from clouds and fills rivers, lakes and oceans. On Titan, clouds spew hydrocarbons like methane and ethane – which are gases on Earth – in liquid form due to the moon’s frigid climate.

Rainfall occurs everywhere on Titan, but the equatorial regions are drier than the poles, said study co-author Anezina Solomonidou, a European Space Agency research fellow.

Plains (covering 65% of the surface) and dunes (covering 17% of the surface) made up of frozen bits of methane and other hydrocarbons dominate Titan’s mid-latitudes and equatorial regions, respectively.

Titan is the only solar system object other than Earth boasting stable liquids on the surface, with lakes and seas full of methane being major features at its polar regions. Hilly and mountainous areas, thought to represent exposed portions of Titan’s crust of water ice, represent 14% of the surface.

“What is really fun to think about is if there are any ways that those more complex organics can go down and mix with water in the deep icy crust or deep subsurface ocean,” JPL scientist and study co-author Michael Malaska said.

Noting that on Earth there is a bacterium that can survive just on a hydrocarbon called acetylene and water, Malaska asked, “Could it or something like it live in Titan deep in the crust or ocean where temperatures are a little warmer?”

The map was created seven years before the U.S. space agency is set to launch its Dragonfly mission to dispatch a multi-rotor drone to study Titan’s chemistry and suitability for life. Dragonfly is scheduled to reach Titan in 2034.

“It is not only scientifically important but also really cool – a drone flying around on Titan,” Lopes said. “It will be really exciting.”

Tags: Cassini spacecraft, dragonfly mission, earth, European Space Agency, frozen organic material, hyrdrocarbons, Jupiter’s moon Ganymede, liquid methane, mercury, NASA, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Nature Astronomy, saturn's moon, titan, U.S. Space Agency

Continue Reading

Previous State-Run Banks Report Frauds Of More Than $13 Billion In Six Months: Finance Minister
Next Finance Commission Likely To Reject $12 Billion Package To Help Utilities Cut Pollution: Source

More Stories

  • Featured

Illegal Constructions On Stepwell Led To Indore Temple Tragedy

20 hours ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Assam’s Rural Solar Scheme Fails To Keep The Lights On

20 hours ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Cease ‘Mass Forced Evictions’ At Angkor Wat: Amnesty International

1 day ago Pratirodh Bureau

Recent Posts

  • Illegal Constructions On Stepwell Led To Indore Temple Tragedy
  • Assam’s Rural Solar Scheme Fails To Keep The Lights On
  • Cease ‘Mass Forced Evictions’ At Angkor Wat: Amnesty International
  • Palestinians Mark 47th Land Day Amid Calls To End Israeli Occupation
  • Sexual Harassment: Kalakshetra Closes College Till April 6
  • Not An Imperial King: Grand Jury Indicts Ex-US Prez Donald Trump
  • Rahul, Modi & Politics With The Gloves Off
  • Treated Wastewater Reuse Could Cut 1.3 Million Tonnes Of Emissions
  • ‘Global Scamsters’ Defending PM: Congress On Lalit Modi Tweet
  • Most Himalayan Glaciers Analysed Melting At Varying Rates: Govt
  • Beyond Patriarchy: Matrilineal Societies Exist Around The World
  • Rahul Gandhi To Launch Agitation From Kolar On April 5
  • Nagaland Scientist’s Tiny Sensor To Tell If Food Is Spoiled
  • ‘Attack Me…Not Freedom Fighters’: Ro Khanna
  • ‘Convenor Of Corrupt Alliance’: Kharge On Modi
  • Earlier Covid Origin Disclosure May Have Saved Political Argy-Bargy
  • Can We Trust Machines Doing The News?
  • Olive Ridley Turtle Nesting Site In Konkan Faces New Threat
  • Petty Politics Of Petty Men: Kapil Sibal’s Swipe At Govt
  • Since Musk Took Over, Antisemitism On Twitter More Than Doubled

Search

Main Links

  • Home
  • Newswires
  • Politics & Society
  • The New Feudals
  • World View
  • Arts And Aesthetics
  • For The Record
  • About Us

Related Stroy

  • Featured

Illegal Constructions On Stepwell Led To Indore Temple Tragedy

20 hours ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Assam’s Rural Solar Scheme Fails To Keep The Lights On

20 hours ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Cease ‘Mass Forced Evictions’ At Angkor Wat: Amnesty International

1 day ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Palestinians Mark 47th Land Day Amid Calls To End Israeli Occupation

1 day ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Sexual Harassment: Kalakshetra Closes College Till April 6

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau

Recent Posts

  • Illegal Constructions On Stepwell Led To Indore Temple Tragedy
  • Assam’s Rural Solar Scheme Fails To Keep The Lights On
  • Cease ‘Mass Forced Evictions’ At Angkor Wat: Amnesty International
  • Palestinians Mark 47th Land Day Amid Calls To End Israeli Occupation
  • Sexual Harassment: Kalakshetra Closes College Till April 6
Copyright © All rights reserved. | CoverNews by AF themes.