Gemini North and Keck Probe Saturn's Moon Titan from Clouds to
Icy Highlands April 2, 2003 Saturn's moon Titan, the second
largest moon in the solar system, is surrounded by a thick
atmosphere of molecular nitrogen with a few percentage points of
methane. This atmosphere appears to host a variety of
meteorological features that show a seasonal cycle. apparent
angular diameter from Earth (~0.8 arcseconds) can be resolved
from the ground only with advanced techniques like adaptive
optics. The opacity of Titan's stratospheric haze decreases
sharply with wavelengths across the visible into the infrared.
There are narrow spectral windows in the near infrared between
the methane bands through which astronomers can probe Titan's
surface and lower atmosphere. Henry Roe (University of
California, Berkeley) and his collaborators used adaptive optics
on the Gemini North and Keck II telescopes to study the
tropospheric haze and the discrete clouds of Titan, and to probe
its surface (Figure 1). Their observations have rev