The Saturn Moon Titan looks very much like Earth from space, with rivers, lakes, and seas full of rain. While these areas may look unusual, they are made of materials that are undoubtedly different – liquid methane streams flow through the Titan plateau and nitrogen gases form dunes of hydrocarbon sand. The presence of these materials – their mechanical properties are very different from those of silicate-based materials that make up some of the well-known sedimentary bodies in our solar system – make the Titan’s surface complex. By identifying a process that would allow hydrocarbon-based materials to form grains of sand or rock depending on how often the winds are blowing and the flow of streams,
The Titan, which is intended to explore space because it is uninhabitable, is the only body in our solar system known to have a fluid-like transport cycle of the Earth, of today. The new model, published in Geophysical Research Letters April 25, shows how this seasonal cycle drives the bullet movement over the moon.
“Our model adds a cohesive framework that allows us to understand how all these sedimentary spaces interact,” said Lapôtre, an assistant professor of geography at Stanford’s School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences. ” , then we can begin to use the geography left by those sedimentary processes to say something about the climate or history of Titan formation.
In order to create a model that could mimic the formation of the Titanic archipelago, Lapôtre and his colleagues had to solve one of the great mysteries about the planet in the body of the planet: How to make its basic biological compounds – supposedly numerous. much weaker than inanimate silicate grains on Earth – they evolve into grains that form different structures than they simply wear out and are blown away like dust?
In the earth, silicate and mineral deposits are eroded into soil particles over time, passing through winds and streams to eventually form layers of soil – with the help of pressure, groundwater, and sometimes heat – back into rocks. .
In the Titan, researchers thought that similar processes formed on the mounds, plains, and labyrinths of space. But unlike Earth, Mars, and Venus, where rocks are derived from silicate which is a prominent geological material from which fossils are found, it is thought that the remains of Titan are made up of solid organic compounds. Scientists have not been able to show how these natural compounds can grow into grains that can be transported across the moon and into the earth’s crust.
External analogue
A team of researchers has found an answer by looking at Earth’s particles called ooids, which are tiny, round particles that are commonly found in the shallow tropical ocean, such as the Bahamas. Ooids form when calcium carbonate is extracted from a water column and adheres to layers around the grain, such as quartz.
What makes ooids differentiate their formation is chemical rainfall, which allows the ooid to grow, while the process of simultaneous erosion slows growth as grains are blown apart by waves and storms. These two competing methods measure over time to create a stable grain size – a process that researchers suggest is also possible on the Titan.
“We were able to solve the mystery of why there were so many dunes on the Titan for so long even though the building materials were so weak,” Lapôtre said.
Worldwide
Armed with a geographical hypothesis, Lapôtre and co-authors of the study used existing data on the Titan’s climate and how to transport wind-driven sediment to describe its various parallel geological features: dunes near the equator, plateaus. latitudes, and areas of the labyrinth near the poles.
Space modeling and data from Cassini’s machines show that winds are common near the equator, supporting the idea that small immersion and therefore can be created by grains of fine sand there – an important part of the dunes.
Sand grains are also needed to build lunar labyrinth sites near poles. Researchers speculate that these different rocks may resemble karsts in limestone on Earth – but in the Titan, they will be folded elements made of natural molten sand. Flows of rivers and storms often occur near poles, making the remnants much easier to transport rivers than winds. The same process of immersion and abrasion during river transport can provide local availability of coarse sand grains – a source of sandstones thought to form labyrinth terranes.
“We show that on the Titan – as on Earth and what happened on Mars – we have an active sedimentary cycle that can explain the distribution of space through episodic abrasion and sintering of the Titan’s seasons,” Lapôtre said. “It’s very exciting to think about how this different world exists so far, when things are very different, but very similar.”
READ ALSO : Oil prices falling from a sharp decline in China need to worry
