Cassini finds liquid ethane on Titan
Saturn’s largest moon has a hydrocarbon lake
By Ron Cowen
Anyone diving into the extraterrestrial lake known as Ontario Lacus would find an oil baron’s dream. The chilly reservoir, located on the south pole of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, is composed of a key component of crude oil — liquid ethane.
After years of speculation, scientists have now confirmed that Titan, shrouded in hydrocarbons, has at least one ethane lake, Robert Brown of the University of Arizona in Tucson and his colleagues report in the July 31 Nature.
Researchers identified liquid ethane by analyzing infrared data gathered by a spectrometer on the Cassini spacecraft. Ontario Lacus resembles a lake slightly larger than LakeOntario, and models have long suggested that hydrocarbon aerosols in Titan’s thick atmosphere rain down on the moon’s surface. But no one knew if Ontario Lacus or any other lakelike feature on Titan actually contained liquid.