Phys.org reports: Success! Cassini Flies by Titan, Collects Intel on Mysterious Lakes
NASA's Cassini mission flew past Titan early Wednesday morning, successfully completing a complex maneuver that will help scientists better understand one of the solar system's most intriguing moons.
Beginning around midnight, a team of scientists and engineers guided the spacecraft into an orbit that allowed them to bounce a radio signal off the surface of Titan toward Earth, where it was received by a land-based telescope array 1 billion miles away.
"We are essentially using Titan as a mirror," said Essam Marouf of San Jose State University, who's a member of the Cassini radio science team. "And the nature of the echo can tell us about the nature of Titan's surface, whether it is liquid or solid, and the physical properties of the material."
NASA used the same approach in an earlier mission and are using this fly-by to gather additional information about the surface of Titan, specifically in the region between the Titan lakes Ligea Mare and Kraken Mare. The data-collection period lasted nearly 12 hours. Data is currently being analyzed and researchers hope to report early results next week.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22 2014, @12:35AM
Cool and well written summary.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22 2014, @01:50AM
NASA bounces signal billion miles, while 0.8 billion people still don't have safe drinking water.
This is not absurd at all, our world is completely in order.
Karel Kulhavy, Twibright Labs [twibright.com]
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday June 22 2014, @02:31AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by edIII on Sunday June 22 2014, @05:59AM
You're such a compassionate soul feeding the trolls the way you do...
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday June 22 2014, @07:04AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 3, Insightful) by urza9814 on Monday June 23 2014, @02:44PM
I don't understand this stuff. We spend half the federal budget slaughtering children thousands of miles away, and it's rather rare to see anyone strongly opposing that. But the second someone mentions NASA -- far below 1% of that same budget -- everyone's got all these great ideas on better ways to spend the money.
Because apparently murder is so much more important than advancing the frontiers of science and tech. Even on a nerd news site. Shameful.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22 2014, @03:14AM
Here you are troll. Water just for you.
On tap in space: Urine will not go to waste. [go.com]
Water for the rest of us.
How has NASA helped improve our air and water? [howstuffworks.com]