The mission description is now online (1.0 Mb PDF).

I see the "Playback timeline/flyby geometry is not available for Titan-XY" is becoming something of a norm. I can already see the mission description for Titan 33:

"Mission Description is not available for Titan-33"

For some reason our computer system encounters a bug and won't open this PDF. I'd be most grateful if someone would kindly provide a brief verbal summary of what's being done this time around.

RADAR: SAR pass covering part of Ganesa Macula. The swath overlaps with Ta SAR and Ta/T3 altimetry. End of swath close to VIMS 'mountains'.

UVIS: Eta Ursa Major stellar occ.

ISS: some atmospheric and surface observations, tracking changes in surface color, limb hazes, etc.

MAPS: plasma wake analysis, interaction with magnetosphere, etc.

INMS: atmospheric / ionospheric thermal structure.

MIMI: micro-scale and near aspects of Titan interaction (w/ magnetosphere?).

Thanks ugordan

It also seems that the mission descriptions for the flybys are being released later and later. At some point there will be:

"BTW, we flew past one of the moons the other day. It was the bigger one...."


But seriously, it's very important that a much stronger effort be made to engage the public by providing as much media and content as possible. This is a huge achievement and should be used to proactively re-engage the paying public into funding furthe exploration. Imagine if every day the CNN anchor (I'm thinking Miles O'Brien would be a likely vehicle) started the daily broadcast with "Dude, we have a probe in Saturn orbit...how cool is that?"

In all fairness I don't think they are releasing the descriptions later and later. The release date just oscillates, sometimes it's a week before the flyby, sometimes only a day.

Since we're being fair, Gordan, one might also note that in this phase of the tour, the interval between Titan flybys (especially the more recent ones) has been compressed. I'm all for more public disclosure, but the science and operations teams really have to scramble to fine tune for a given flyby. While broad science objectives (and the sequence development) for a given flyby are planned far in advance, there are some things that just can't be pushed out the door too quickly for public consumption.

I totally agree, science objectives and mission planning is foremost. But it would be a really good idea to have a stronger public outreach program in place. Maybe this would be an opportunity for additional journalistic internships (webslingers, bloggers, spin-doctors, and future science reporters) to be added to mission staff?

One thing is for sure: Cassini sure ain't MER when it comes to public outreach. For one thing, the various Cassini science and instrument teams are hyper-parochial and proprietary with their data, even amongst themselves. So I wouldn't hold my breath for any one of them to sit down with Doug for an hourlong chat discussing science and operational details.

Which is a true shame, since trying to get funding for the next flagship missions (emphasis on the plural) will require public (i.e. taxpayer and electorate) support. To say nothing of inspiring the next generation of planetary scientists who will be driving the next outer planet missions.

Some comments on the relative prominence of Mars and Saturn at this site:

Bill

So Which Planet is on Your Coffee Table?

Newly published high-profile books get set out prominently on the display tables at the front of Borders in downtown Santa Cruz. During this past holiday season, one of the prime spots was given to Postcards from Mars by Cornell’s Jim Bell, who is the Pancam lead scientist for NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Mission. The book is superbly produced. The Pancams’ high resolution allows the photos in the fold-out spreads to convey an impact that’s hard to achieve by surfing the NASA website with your browser.

With all the focus on Mars, I think the public tends to forget that Cassini, NASA’s flagship mission, is sending back an even more amazing trove of images from a far more alien environment. Indeed, Jeff Cuzzi (a colleague from my NASA Ames days) along with Laura Lovett and Joan Horvath, have just written a coffee-table book, Saturn: A New view, that highlights the most stunning images of the Saturnian system. At the moment, the book is buried back in the science section at Borders, but it absolutely deserves a spot out in front as well. The “upgrade”, if you will, from Voyager to Cassini is an order of magnitude more impressive than the jump from Viking to Spirit and Opportunity.

I was nine years old when Viking 1 landed on Mars in 1976, and I vividly remember seeing the first images of the martian surface on the CBS morning news. I know that I was quite interested when the Voyagers sent back the first close-ups of Saturn and its environs, but I can’t remember the exact moment of seeing those photos for the first time. A quarter century later, this same gap in enthusiasm is reflected by the fact that the Mars book has an Amazon sales rank that is way ahead of the Saturn book.

The Saturn book is quite interesting. Way too many rings images compared to satellite images, but oh well.

What else would one expect from Jeff Cuzzi?

One shouldn't be too surprised about the "interest gap" between Mars and Saturn; the former has occupied a special place in popular culture for a long, long time.

I'm more of a Jupiter nut myself, but oh well...

PIA09115: Titan Dunes over Possible Craters (T23)

Hey guys. Quick comment on the Mission Descriptions:

Unfortunately, the Flyby Geometry and Playback Timelines are provided by the Mission Planning team who have been incredibly busy with the Extended Mission Tour evaluations (in fact we all have).

And sorry for the delays. We try to post them a week before but when things get crazy, Mission Descriptions (for better or worse) are sometimes a lower priority item for us and might be delayed a day or two.

Believe me when I say, I wish we had a person dedicated to these "public outreach" efforts. That would be awesome but unfortunately we all have a lot on our plates with Operations.

If any of you guys want to write them for us... we are taking applications now. ;^)

-Douglas

PIA09175: A New Crater on Titan?
PIA09176: Ganesa Macula

cool. I wonder if there was enough difference in incidence angle to measure the topography of Ganesa. I guess we will find out at LSPC.

Wow...
Looks like Cassini's sight gets better and better...
Those details on the "crater" are simply marvellous!

"Those details on the "crater" are simply marvellous!"

It's big enough and there's enough non-worn-down relief that it LOOKS LIKE SOMETHING! Cassini's radar is good but unfortunately, Titan needs several times higher resolution than Cassini can do. Venus was much more cooperative in terms of the size and relief of the important geologic details. Titan's important stuff is <expletive deleted> smaller.

By the way: that Ganesa sure looks like a volcano to me! But then I don't know anything about geology...so what do the experts here say? Was the VIMS team right? I was pretty sceptical then...

Ganesa Macula in simulated perspective:

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This is a decidedly non-expert opinion, but this thing sure looks familiar. The shape and flow features to the east make a pretty convincing case.

Here's a preliminary geologic map of Ganesa from the 2006 LPSC abstract "Eruption of Ammonia-Water Cryomagmas on Titan 2: Eruption Styles and Landfroms". The abstract is found on pp.44-45 of the PDF linked below. Fascinating stuff:

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LPSC 2006 Saturn System Abstracts

Enjoy !!!

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Cool!!!

This is a really neat RADAR Swath! Cryovolacanos, Tectonic Ridges, Windblown Deposits, Eroded Impact crater, Alluvial Fans, Channels, Dunes, Breached and Degraded Impact Craters, Tidal Channels, and Rotted Terrain.

I lined up the lower section of the T23 Swath with a section of the ISS image PIA08399. This section is in the area near W Senkyo and E Quivira and E Aztlan. It covers the complex interchange between the Fensal, Aaru, Aztlan and Senkyo Sand Sea Basins. The T23 Swath went right over the “Playboy Bunny” Feature E of Elba Facula.

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The first slide shows key features indicated that I used for the lineup. The second image shows the two key features with EW purple coordination lines, and an orange line running near the midline of the Swath. The third image shows the two coordinated image with only the lines, and the fourth image shows the coordinated RADAR image with the ISS image but without coordination lines.

-Mike

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The E Quivira section of the T23 RADAR Swath shows some pretty impressive channels. The dendritic pattern seems to indicate a southerly flow. There appear to be even large channel networks to the W. These channels would presumably dump into the Aztlan/Senkyo Basin. It is unclear what their origin is: Is this part of Aaru, Fensal, or an interbasin area. If the flow was predominately southward, this implies that Aaru/Fensal or the interbasin was at a higher liquid level than the Aztlan/Senkyo Basin. Weird.

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The next section is of the “Playboy Bunny” part. (Might be more appropriate to think of Brer Rabbit in the tarpit – probably closer composition-wise). In the really big section (twisted to horizontal so it would fit better), from left to right are: Dunes galore. Even though this is right at the equator, the dunes show a predominant orientation to the ESE. Not how in the main channel of Aztlan, the dunes are convergent towards mid-channel, yet downwind of the nose of the Playboy Bunny, they appear divergent.

About where the bunny’s head would be, there are some oval bright center objects. These all look like the center part of Coats Facula and may share a common origin. The orientation of the squish appears roughly to the NNE (like Elba Facula and Coats Facula) Near both these features, and all up and down the Bunny head is evidence of large channels, These seem either oriented NS, or EW. There might even be some bright channel streambeds. It will be really neat to get a higher resolution release of this RADAR swath. Most of these channels seem to have an ice margin substrate or are covered in RADAR medium bright cobbles.

There are also a few craters in the Bunny area. (Some craters in the straits of Aztlan were already released in PIA09115.) One is a breached crater (possibly transitioning from single to multiple breached) while the other to the S (or R in the image) is a Degraded crater.



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One neat-o feature is what appears to be a tidal channel that would have connected the Elba Facula basin (crater?) with Senkyo. This looks just like the channel seen in the T8 RADAR Swath. Like that channel, this one seems to terminate in a dark terminal flushpool (indicated by purple arrows). A carefully oriented ISS and RADAR comparson shows the tidal channels (red arrows) and the eastern flush pool (blue arrow). It is gratifying to see that the ISS image shows the channel and flush pool as dark areas also, consistent with them being low lying.

The southern area in this graphic shows two bright areas that might be parallel tectonic ridges, with what might have once been another channel, now filled in with ice sand or other RADAR medium bright material, in between them.

A recurring theme in the the Equatorial Sand Seas seem to be iinterconnections by straits, channels, and sounds. Titan has a lot of shoreline.

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Continuing further south, there is an area of rotten terrain like we saw at the intersection of the T25/T3 Swaths. This is apparent on RADAR by the broken and mottled appearance of the terrain. As if Titan were made of Swiss cheese (might even match VIMS data and be consistent with dielectric constant data– anyone check?) This area also looks different in the ISS image. To the SE of this rotted terrain in the ISS image is an enigmatic black spot that unfortunately just got missed by the RADAR Swath.

-Mike

To me those "tidal channels" in Playboy Bunny look a lot more like a braided river system.

To see what braided rivers look like from above have a look in Google Earth for example at 44deg30min S, 169deg33min E or 43deg52min S, 170deg29min E . I picked those two since I happen to have seen them on the ground, but similar structures are common in flattish areas without vegetation cover and strongly varying precipitation.

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".... The T23 Swath went right over the “Playboy Bunny” Feature E of Elba Facula..."

I still think they should name the bunny feature "Hefner" <sp?>

Well...we've got "Si-Si the Halloween Cat" (unofficial)....how about Little Bunny Foo-Foo?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjSnlvGHOWA

Hey, that's fantastic with the tidal channels. Titan has the prospect of really high tides, and with the generally flat topography, there could be some large areas that were periodically washed out, and looking for the effects of tidal flow could tell us a lot about the history of the aquifer level.

It's excruciatingly tantalizing to ponder when these sand seas were last methane seas. 2002? 1995? 10,000 BC? It seems beyond reach that seasonal rains could flood such a large area in the current epoch, but maybe part or all could be submerged during the XXM.