Will Nuclear Robot Ship Sail Saturn's Moon?
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
One of NASA's next great adventures could take place with a raindrop-flecked camera bobbing around on extraterrestrial waves. Or at least, that's the hope of several researchers who want to sail an unmanned, nuclear-powered capsule on Saturn's moon Titan.
Titan eerily resembles Earth with characteristics such as wind, rain and lakes, but all within the bounds of a frigid environment where liquid methane and ethane replace water. The many lakes dotting the moon's surface suggested an alternative mission proposal compared to the usual rovers and hard surface landers that NASA has sent to other destinations.
"We got funded to look at the possibility of sending a lake lander to Titan," said Ellen Stofan, a geologist with Proxemy Research in Maryland. "Scientifically, it's sort of a beyond obvious thing to do."
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