MAY 08, 2018

How NASA Could Study Titan's Oceans

WRITTEN BY: Anthony Bouchard

NASA has an interest in exploring Titan's oceans and plans to take an unconventional approach to studying them: send an interplanetary submarine to dive deep below their surfaces.

But Titan's oceans aren't like those on Earth; they're much colder and made up of super-chilled methane rather than water. In fact, the composition, pressure, and temperature that the submarine would experience make designing such a vehicle into a tough job.

Fortunately, scientists have re-created miniature versions of Titan's oceans inside of a pressurized chamber and are using this recreation to study technology that might be effective for exploring Titan's oceans. This research could push advancements in such technology forward and pioneer new ways of analyzing Titan and its potentially-habitable environment.