LAKES of methane may cover around three-quarters of Saturn’s moon Titan, according to radio echoes from this mystery world. So the European Space Agency’s Huygens probe could be heading for a splashdown when it parachutes down to the moon’s surface in January 2005.
Ever since the Voyager fly-bys of the 1980s, scientists have wondered whether pools of liquid hydrocarbons exist on Titan. But proving it has been difficult because the moon is shrouded by a thick nitrogen-rich atmosphere, which blocks the view of its surface at optical wavelengths.
Rough maps from infrared observations of Titan’s surface hinted mainly at water…
