Titan's surface revealed

Paris, 05 Jul 2004

Piercing the layer of smog enshrouding Titan, these images from the NASA/ESA/ASI Cassini-Huygens spacecraft reveal an exotic surface covered with a variety of materials in the southern hemisphere.

Using near-infrared light, these images taken by the visual and infrared mapping spectrometer reveal the surface with unusual clarity. This colour image shows a false-colour combination of three previous images taken with different colour filters.

The yellow areas correspond to the hydrocarbon-rich regions, while the green areas are the icier regions. Here, the methane cloud appears white, as it is bright in all three wavelengths. A circular feature that may be a crater is visible in the north.

European Space Agency
http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/index.ht ml
Item source: http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMEDQL2 6WD_index_0.html