Science goals and new mission concepts for future exploration of Titan's
atmosphere geology and habitability: Titan POlar Scout/orbitEr and In situ
lake lander and DrONe explorer (POSEIDON)
atmosphere geology and habitability: Titan POlar Scout/orbitEr and In situ
lake lander and DrONe explorer (POSEIDON)
File(s)s10686-021-09815-8.pdf (8.59 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
In response to ESA’s “Voyage 2050” announcement of opportunity, we propose an ambitious L-class mission to explore one of the most exciting bodies in the Solar System, Saturn’s largest moon Titan. Titan, a “world with two oceans”, is an organic-rich body with interior-surface-atmosphere interactions that are comparable in complexity to the Earth. Titan is also one of the few places in the Solar System with habitability potential. Titan’s remarkable nature was only partly revealed by the Cassini-Huygens mission and still holds mysteries requiring a complete exploration using a variety of vehicles and instruments. The proposed mission concept POSEIDON (Titan POlar Scout/orbitEr and In situ lake lander DrONe explorer) would perform joint orbital and in situ investigations of Titan. It is designed to build on and exceed the scope and scientific/technological accomplishments of Cassini-Huygens, exploring Titan in ways that were not previously possible, in particular through full close-up and in situ coverage over long periods of time. In the proposed mission architecture, POSEIDON consists of two major elements: a spacecraft with a large set of instruments that would orbit Titan, preferably in a low-eccentricity polar orbit, and a suite of in situ investigation components, i.e. a lake lander, a “heavy” drone (possibly amphibious) and/or a fleet of mini-drones, dedicated to the exploration of the polar regions. The ideal arrival time at Titan would be slightly before the next northern Spring equinox (2039), as equinoxes are the most active periods to monitor still largely unknown atmospheric and surface seasonal changes. The exploration of Titan’s northern latitudes with an orbiter and in situ element(s) would be highly complementary in terms of timing (with possible mission timing overlap), locations, and science goals with the upcoming NASA New Frontiers Dragonfly mission that will provide in situ exploration of Titan’s equatorial regions, in the mid-2030s.
Date Issued
2022-12-01
Date Acceptance
2021-10-14
Citation
Experimental Astronomy: an international journal on astronomical instrumentation and data analysis, 2022, 54, pp.911-973
ISSN
0922-6435
Publisher
Springer
Start Page
911
End Page
973
Journal / Book Title
Experimental Astronomy: an international journal on astronomical instrumentation and data analysis
Volume
54
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2022. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Identifier
http://arxiv.org/abs/2110.10466v1
Subjects
astro-ph.EP
astro-ph.EP
astro-ph.IM
Notes
arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1908.01374
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2022-01-11