Titan lakes: characterization of physical properties by combined electromagnetic models of SAR and radiometric data

Abstract

From the analysis derived from the SAR imagery acquired by the Cassini RADAR, Titan reveals a complex surface with dark and bright areas, periodic structures and dark lake-like features, which resemble terrestrial lakes. The abundant methane in Titan’s atmosphere combined with the low temperature, around 89 K, lead scientists to interpret them as lakes of liquid methane or ethane. This paper presents an electromagnetic model of liquid surfaces combined with an inversion algorithm in order to retrieve information on liquid surface. The inferred physical surface parameters are then used as input to a forward radiative transfer model to obtain simulated brightness temperatures. The observed and computed brightness temperatures are compared to address the consistency of the observations from these two different Cassini RADAR modes.