Ocean Waves On Saturn's Moon Titan May Have Been Spied By NASA's Cassini Spacecraft
After years of searching, planetary scientists think they may finally have spotted waves rippling on the seas of Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. If confirmed, this would be the first discovery of ocean waves beyond Earth.
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft spied several unusual glints of sunlight off the surface of Punga Mare, one of Titan’s hydrocarbon seas, in 2012 and 2013. Those reflections may come from tiny ripples, no more than 2 centimeters high, that are disturbing the otherwise flat ocean, says Jason Barnes, a planetary scientist at the University of Idaho in Moscow.
Barnes presented the findings today at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, where a second talk hinted at the presence of waves in another of Titan’s seas.
Researchers expect more waves to appear in the next few years, because winds are anticipated to pick up as Titan’s northern hemisphere — where most of its seas are located — emerges from winter and approaches spring.
“Titan may be beginning to stir,” says Ralph Lorenz, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. “Oceanography is no longer just an Earth science.”
On its many flights past Titan, Cassini discovered small lakes and large seas of methane, ethane and other hydrocarbon compounds. Liquid rains down on the moon’s surface and then evaporates, setting up a complex weather system that includes, presumably, wind patterns.
But the probe had never spotted wind rippling the surface of Titan’s seas. They seemed as smooth as glass. That could be because the liquid hydrocarbons are more viscous than water and thus harder to get moving, or because the winds on Titan are simply not strong enough to blow the liquid into ripples. In 2010, Lorenz and others proposed that the winds would strengthen as Titan moved towards spring, allowing scientists a better chance to spot waves. Saturn and its moons take about 29 Earth years to go around the Sun.
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