Organic sedimentary deposits in Titan's dry lakebeds: Probable evaporite
Nicholson, Philip D.; Sotin, Christophe; Barnes, Jason W.; Soderblom, Jason M.; Le Mouélic, Stéphane; Rodriguez, Sebastien; Baines, Kevin H.; Buratti, Bonnie J.; Clark, Roger N.; Brown, Robert H.; Jaumann, Ralf; Soderblom, Laurence A.; Vixie, Graham; Bow, Jacob; Stephan, Katrin; Hayes, Alexander G.; Schwartz, Jacob
United States, France, Germany
Abstract
We report the discovery of organic sedimentary deposits at the bottom of dry lakebeds near Titan's north pole in observations from the Cassini Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS). We show evidence that the deposits are evaporitic, making Titan just the third known planetary body with evaporitic processes after Earth and Mars, and is the first that uses a solvent other than water.