Raising mountains on Saturn’s moon Titan

(Aug. 17, 2010) — Saturn's moon Titan ripples with mountains, and scientists have been trying to figure out how they form. The best explanation, it turns out, is that Titan is shrinking as it cools, wrinkling up the moon's surface like a raisin. A new model developed by scientists working with radar data obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows that differing densities in the outermost layers of Titan can account for the unusual surface behavior. Titan is slowly cooling because it is releasing heat from its original formation and radioactive isotopes are decaying in the interior. As this happens, parts ... Read More

Cassini bags Enceladus ‘Tigers’

(Aug. 17, 2010) — NASA's Cassini spacecraft has successfully completed its flyby over the "tiger stripes" in the south polar region of Saturn's moon Enceladus and has sent back images of its passage. The spacecraft also targeted the moon Tethys. The tiger stripes are actually giant fissures that spew jets of water vapor and organic particles hundreds of kilometers, or miles, out into space. While the winter is darkening the moon's southern hemisphere, Cassini has its own version of "night vision goggles" -- the composite infrared spectrometer instrument -- to track heat even when visible light is low. It will ... Read More

Discovery of Saturn’s auroral heartbeat

(Aug. 4, 2010) — An international team of scientists led by Dr Jonathan Nichols of the University of Leicester has discovered that Saturn's aurora, an ethereal ultraviolet glow which illuminates Saturn's upper atmosphere near the poles, pulses roughly once per Saturnian day. The length of a Saturnian day has been under much discussion since it was discovered that the traditional 'clock' used to measure the rotation period of Saturn, a gas giant planet with no solid surface for reference, apparently does not keep good time. Saturn, like all magnetised planets, emits radio waves into space from the polar regions. These radio ... Read More

Blowing in the wind: Cassini helps with dune whodunit on Saturn’s moon Titan

(July 31, 2010) — The answer to the mystery of dune patterns on Saturn's moon Titan did turn out to be blowing in the wind. It just wasn't from the direction many scientists expected. Basic principles describing the rotation of planetary atmospheres and data from the European Space Agency's Huygens probe led to circulation models that showed surface winds streaming generally east-to-west around Titan's equatorial belt. But when NASA's Cassini spacecraft obtained the first images of dunes on Titan in 2005, the dunes' orientation suggested the sands -- and therefore the winds -- were moving from the opposite direction, or ... Read More

Hints of Earth Splash a Saturnian Moon Landscape

The discovery that Titan’s lakes are evaporating, at least in the Southern Hemisphere, suggests that there are active weather and geological cycles analogous to those on Earth.By By DENNIS OVERBYE

New Evidence of a Fluid Sea on Saturn’s Moon Titan

Scientist analyzing a glint of sunlight from Titan believe that Kraken Mare exists in a liquid state across 150,000 square miles.By By WILLIAM J. BROAD

An Odyssey From the Bronx to Saturn’s Rings

Carolyn Porco, head of the Cassini mission’s camera team, has been pursuing a future glimpsed through a rooftop telescope at 13.By By DENNIS OVERBYE

A Saturn Spectacular, With Gravity’s Help

Scientists have a plan to extend the life, on relatively little fuel, of NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, now in its sixth year of studying Saturn.By By GUY GUGLIOTTA

On an Icy Moon of Saturn, Gravity Causes Plenty of Moving and Shaking

What’s heating the inside of Saturn’s moon Enceladus?By By HENRY FOUNTAIN

In a Hole in the Ice in Greenland, Proof of a Forested Past

Ice can be loaded with dirt and, by consequence, fragments of ancient DNA that have been preserved by the cold.By By HENRY FOUNTAIN