International. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) revealed some of the findings made by the Cassini probe, including one that has shocked everyone. It turns out that the probe found on Saturn's moon Titan, hydrocarbon reserves greater than all known oil and natural gas on Earth. According to scientists at Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, those hydrocarbons fall from the sky and form large deposits in the form of lakes and dunes. Ralph Lorenz, a member of the science team that monitors Cassini's radar operations in the lab, told reporters: "Titan is covered by carbon-containing material. It's a gigantic factory of organic materials."
Scientists already had an idea of this news for more than two years, because the Cassini probe descended on January 14, 2005 on Titan and released the Huygens probe there, the latter has been there since then.
"These huge carbon deposits are an important window into Titan's geology and meteorological history," he added. The average temperature on Titan is 179 degrees Celsius below zero and instead of water, its surface is covered by hydrocarbons in the form of methane and ethane.
Its dunes are made up of "tolines," a term coined in 1979 by astronomer and astrophysicist Carl Sagan to describe primitive organic molecules. So far Cassini has conducted a mapping exploration of 20 percent of Titan's surface and hundreds of lakes and seas have been observed, the probe was sent in 1997 and in 2004 made its arrival at Saturn.
Scientists already had an idea of this news for more than two years, because the Cassini probe descended on January 14, 2005 on Titan and released the Huygens probe there, the latter has been there since then.
