The Carbon Budget of Titan and its Effect on the Organic Landscape of Titan's Surface

Details The Carbon Budget of Titan and its Effect on the Organic Landscape of Titan's Surface The Carbon Budget of Titan and its Effect on the Organic Landscape of Titan's Surface

Dec 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009agufm.p51g1188w&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2009, abstract #P51G-1188

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[5405] Planetary Sciences: Solid Surface Planets / Atmospheres, [5410] Planetary Sciences: Solid Surface Planets / Composition, [5470] Planetary Sciences: Solid Surface Planets / Surface Materials And Properties, [6281] Planetary Sciences: Solar System Objects / Titan

Scientific paper

The confirmation of methane as the most abundant chemically active constituent in Titan’s atmosphere and the existence of simple hydrocarbons by observations from the Voyager flyby [1] led to the theory that Titan’s surface contained a substantial ethane ocean as a result of methane photolysis [2]. However, recent observations from the Cassini-Huygens mission have shown no evidence of a global ocean of ethane, but rather surface features that correspond to lakes and/or seas [3] that represent only a fraction of the condensate predicted by earlier studies. With the aid of an updated and comprehensive photochemical model, the nature of Titan’s carbon budget and the role that ethane condensation plays in this budget are examined. Model results show that, considering a much more heterogeneous suite of end products, only 40% of methane destruction results in ethane formation, with a net production rate of 2.7×10(9) molecules cm(-2) s(-1), due primarily to acetylenic catalysis in Titan’s stratosphere. This corresponds to a liquid ethane layer of several hundred meters over geologic time. However, episodic methane outgassing, subsurface sequestration, and chemical processing of Titan’s surface are likely responsible for the reduction of ethane condensate on Titan’s surface to less than ten meters globally averaged. [1] Hanel, R. et al., Science, 212, 192-200, 1981. [2] Lunine, J.L. et al., Science, 222, 1229-1240, 1983. [3] Stofan, E.R. et al., Nature, 445, 61-64, 2007.

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