Evolution of Titan’s atmosphere during the Late Heavy Bombardment

Marounina, Nadejda; Tobie, G.; Carpy, S.; Monteux, J.; Charnay, Benjamin; Grasset, O.

doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2015.05.011

Cited by 13 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…Conversion of NH 3 to N 2 by photolysis [ Atreya et al , ], shock chemistry [ McKay et al , ], and thermal decomposition in the interior [ Glein et al , ] do not significantly alter the 14 N/ 15 N ratio [ Berezhnoi , ]. Sekine et al [] also suggested that impacts into ammonium hydrate in the crust could convert NH 3 into N 2 ; however, Marounina et al [] showed that impact erosion of Titan's atmosphere would be very efficient. Escape processes (Jean's, sputtering, and/or hydrodynamic) are not efficient enough to fractionate Titan's N 2 over the age of the solar system [ Mandt et al , , ].…”

Section: The Age and Origin Of Titan's Atmospherementioning

confidence: 99%

Titan's atmosphere and climate

2017

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Titan is the only moon with a substantial atmosphere, the only other thick N2 atmosphere besides Earth's, the site of extraordinarily complex atmospheric chemistry that far surpasses any other solar system atmosphere, and the only other solar system body with stable liquid currently on its surface. The connection between Titan's surface and atmosphere is also unique in our solar system; atmospheric chemistry produces materials that are deposited on the surface and subsequently altered by surface‐atmosphere interactions such as aeolian and fluvial processes resulting in the formation of extensive dune fields and expansive lakes and seas. Titan's atmosphere is favorable for organic haze formation, which combined with the presence of some oxygen‐bearing molecules indicates that Titan's atmosphere may produce molecules of prebiotic interest. The combination of organics and liquid, in the form of water in a subsurface ocean and methane/ethane in the surface lakes and seas, means that Titan may be the ideal place in the solar system to test ideas about habitability, prebiotic chemistry, and the ubiquity and diversity of life in the universe. The Cassini‐Huygens mission to the Saturn system has provided a wealth of new information allowing for study of Titan as a complex system. Here I review our current understanding of Titan's atmosphere and climate forged from the powerful combination of Earth‐based observations, remote sensing and in situ spacecraft measurements, laboratory experiments, and models. I conclude with some of our remaining unanswered questions as the incredible era of exploration with Cassini‐Huygens comes to an end.

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Section: The Age and Origin Of Titan's Atmospherementioning

confidence: 99%

Titan's atmosphere and climate

2017

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“…These considerations, coupled with detection of radiogenic 40 Ar by Huygens (Niemann et al 2005) suggest that outgassing from the interior may be responsible for the atmosphere. New isotopic measurements of noble gases and methane are necessary to resolve key questions concerning the ocean composition, the evolution of the interior and atmosphere, and the formation of Titan (Glein 2015(Glein , 2017Marounina et al 2015Marounina et al , 2018Miller et al 2019;Journaux et al 2020a).…”

Section: Pressing Questions and Future Investigationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Titan: Earth-like on the Outside, Ocean World on the Inside

MacKenzie¹,

Birch²,

Hörst³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Thanks to the Cassini-Huygens mission, Titan, the pale orange dot of Pioneer and Voyager encounters has been revealed to be a dynamic, hydrologically-shaped, organic-rich ocean world offering unparalleled opportunities to explore prebiotic chemistry. And while Cassini-Huygens revolutionized our understanding of each of the three "layers" of Titan-the atmosphere, the surface, and the interior-we are only beginning to hypothesize how these realms interact. In this paper, we summarize the current state of Titan knowledge and discuss how future exploration of Titan would address some of the next decade's most compelling planetary science questions. We also demonstrate why exploring

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“…But our integrated losses might only be lower values if its atmosphere would have formed early-on, since we did not consider atmospheric escape through impact erosion. Marounina et al (2015) simulated this process on Titan during the Late Heavy Bombardment (LHB) and found that it could have eroded up to 5 times the present-day atmosphere, if it was already present at that time. This would increase our estimates to initial reservoirs of 6.62, 8.20, and 21.73 times the present-day atmospheric reservoir for a small, moderate, and fast rotator, respectively.…”

Section: Nitrogen Escape Through Timementioning

confidence: 99%

Escape and evolution of Titan's N$_2$ atmosphere constrained by $^{14}$N/$^{15}$N isotope ratios

Erkaev,

Scherf,

Thaller

et al. 2020

Preprint

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We apply a 1D upper atmosphere model to study thermal escape of nitrogen over Titan's history. Significant thermal escape should have occurred very early for solar EUV fluxes 100 to 400 times higher than today with escape rates as high as ≈ 1.5 × 10 28 s −1 and ≈ 4.5×10 29 s −1 , respectively, while today it is ≈ 7.5×10 17 s −1 . Depending on whether the Sun originated as a slow, moderate or fast rotator, thermal escape was the dominant escape process for the first 100 to 1000 Myr after the formation of the solar system. If Titan's atmosphere originated that early, it could have lost between ≈ 0.5 − 16 times its present atmospheric mass depending on the Sun's rotational evolution. We also investigated the mass-balance parameter space for an outgassing of Titan's nitrogen through decomposition of NH 3 -ices in its deep interior. Our study indicates that, if Titan's atmosphere originated at the beginning, it could have only survived until today if the Sun was a slow rotator. In other cases, the escape would have been too strong for the degassed nitrogen to survive until presentday, implying later outgassing or an additional nitrogen source. An endogenic origin of Titan's nitrogen partially through NH 3 -ices is consistent with its initial fractionation of 14 N/ 15 N ≈ 166 -172, or lower if photochemical removal was relevant for longer than the last ≈ 1,000 Myr. Since this ratio is slightly above the ratio of cometary ammonia, some of Titan's nitrogen might have originated from refractory organics.

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Evolution of Titan’s atmosphere during the Late Heavy Bombardment

Cited by 13 publications

References 65 publications

Titan's atmosphere and climate

Titan's atmosphere and climate

Titan: Earth-like on the Outside, Ocean World on the Inside

Escape and evolution of Titan's N$_2$ atmosphere constrained by $^{14}$N/$^{15}$N isotope ratios

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