Radio telescopes recover Titan wind data
Posted: Thu, Feb 10, 2005, 6:14 AM ET (1114 GMT)
Scientists have been able to recover data from ESA's Huygens probe on Titan's winds that had been feared lost because of a glitch. An experiment on Cassini was designed to measure wind speeds in Titan's atmosphere as the probe descended on January 14, but the data from the experiment were lost because of a configuration error on Cassini, which relayed the probe's transmission back to Earth. However, a network of radio telescopes, including the Green Bank Telescope in the US and the Parkes telescope in Australia, listening to Huygens' signal directly, has been able to reconstruct the wind profile by measuring the Doppler shift in the signal as winds buffeted the probe. This reconstructed data shows that wind speeds reached 430 km/h in the upper atmosphere but are far weaker near the surface. Scientists hope to close the remaining gaps in the wind data by incorporating additional observations by other radio telescopes.
Scientists have been able to recover data from ESA's Huygens probe on Titan's winds that had been feared lost because of a glitch. An experiment on Cassini was designed to measure wind speeds in Titan's atmosphere as the probe descended on January 14, but the data from the experiment were lost because of a configuration error on Cassini, which relayed the probe's transmission back to Earth. However, a network of radio telescopes, including the Green Bank Telescope in the US and the Parkes telescope in Australia, listening to Huygens' signal directly, has been able to reconstruct the wind profile by measuring the Doppler shift in the signal as winds buffeted the probe. This reconstructed data shows that wind speeds reached 430 km/h in the upper atmosphere but are far weaker near the surface. Scientists hope to close the remaining gaps in the wind data by incorporating additional observations by other radio telescopes.
Related Links:
| <<previous article | next article>> |
|
news in brief
|
|
|
|
news links
|
|
Saturday, February 7
Supermassive black holes sit in ‘eye of their own storms,’ studies find
Univ. of Chicago — 1:08 pm ET (1808 GMT) SpaceX Launching Falcon 9 With 25 Starlink Satellites
Santa Barbara (CA) Edhat — 8:24 am ET (1324 GMT) Epstein Was Adviser Behind Funding of Starlink Rival OneWeb
Bloomberg News — 8:23 am ET (1323 GMT) SpaceX targeting Saturday morning for Falcon 9 rocket launch
KEYT-TV Santa Barbara, CA — 8:22 am ET (1322 GMT) China sends fourth ‘Shenlong’ reusable spacecraft mission into orbit
South China Morning Post — 8:21 am ET (1321 GMT) |
