NASA JPL 2010-078 - 2010 March 04
Planetary scientists have been puzzling for years over the honeycomb patterns and flat valleys with squiggly edges evident in radar images of Saturn's moon Titan. Now, working with a "volunteer researcher" who has put his own spin on data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, they have found some recognizable analogies to a type of spectacular terrain on Earth known as karst topography. A poster session today, Thursday, March 4, at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in The Woodlands, Texas, displays their work.
This artistic interpretation of the Sikun Labyrinthus area on Saturn's moon Titan is based on radar and imaging data from NASA's
Cassini spacecraft and the descent imaging and spectral radiometer on the European Space Agency's Huygens probe. The relative
elevations are speculative and organized around the assumption that fluids are flowing downhill.
(NASA/JPL/ESA/SSI and M. Malaska/B. Jonsson)
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