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Titan Flyby (T-83): Looking at Lakes Again

T-83: Looking at Lakes Again

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Titan's atmosphere makes Saturn's largest moon look like a fuzzy orange ball in this natural color view from the Cassini spacecraft.Images taken using red, green and blue spectral filters were combined to create this natural color view. The images were obtained with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on Jan. 30, 2012.

T-83: Looking at Lakes Again

Radar used synthetic aperture radar (SAR, a technique which uses that spacecraft’s flight path to simulate a very large radar aperture) to detect changes in small lakes seen on the T-16 and T-19 flybys. There is some overlap with territory expected to be seen in T-95, which is set to take place in October 2013.

Other radar observations included inbound and outbound radiometry, high synthetic aperture radar (HiSAR, a method like SAR that can be used when the target is too far away or at the wrong angle for conventional SAR) and altimetry, along with outbound scatterometry.

Inbound, the visible and infrared mapping spectrometer (VIMS) looked for specular reflection on the Northern lakes and also looked to detect clouds to monitor climatic changes after the equinox. The imaging science subsystem (ISS) rodes along with VIMS’ and the composite infrared spectrometer’s (CIRS’) observations to image Titan’s surface and atmosphere, including Adiri and the region where changes were observed in Fall 2010.

With closest approach slightly in the dayside ionosphere, the dual technique magnetometer (MAG) studied the diffusion of the external magnetic field at low altitudes and high solar zenith angles.

Titan Flyby at a Glance

Date
May 22, 2012

Altitude
593 miles (955 km)

Speed
13,000 mph (5.8 km/sec)