At the north pole of Saturn’s largest moon Titan lie the largest (and only known) bodies of surface liquid in the Solar System outside of Earth. But on Titan, where temperatures are regularly around negative 300ºF, the liquid isn’t water but rather methane and ethane: compounds which are found as gases here on Earth. Titan’s seas and lakes are…
Tag: ethane
Smooth as Glass
The dark spot in the middle of this image is Ontario Lacus, possibly a shallow lake filled with liquid methane located near the south pole of Titan, imaged with synthetic-aperture radar by Cassini. Ontario Lacus on Titan covers about 5,800 square miles in area—about four-fifths the size of Lake Ontario here on Earth.
Lights in the Dark 