Revision as of 13:04, 30 June 2021

Earth Moon and Titan to scale. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute/Gregory H. Revera. Related: Intuitively understanding the size of Earth.

This article is about Saturn's giant moon Titan,
and how advanced atomically precise technology could be used to research and eventually colonize this fascinating alien world.

Basic facts

Size

Titan is by far the largest moon of planet Saturn. With almost the size of planet mercury he has a size sufficient to clear his orbit from other objects of similar mass. This criterion just with the sun instead of a planet as main body is used for the relatively new distinction between planets (like e.g. mercury) and dwarf planets (like e.g. pluto). It seems only natural that moons with a property akin to what discerns a planet from a dwarf planet deserve a special title too. So I'll refer to these moons as giant moons complementary to the title dwarf planet. (The titles dwarf planet and giant moon are not mutually exclusive. Plutos companion Charon e.g. takes both.) There are several other giant moons in our solar system but they alle

Atmosphere

Titan is the only moon in the solar system with a "true" atmosphere. In fact the atmosphere has even a slightly higher pressure than what is pressure at Earth's sea level. About 1.5 atm. A pressure very comfy for humans. The temperature is very low though ~95K or about minus 280°C (numbers rounded for easy memorization). Note that this is not much higher than the evaporation point of nitrogen 77K. So the atmosphere is just a dozen and view degrees above the point of condensing out into an liquid nitrogen ocean (or lakes or ground liquid). The low temperature probably plays a big role that Titan can hold his atmosphere despite his small gravity.

Due to the fact that the absolute temperature is about three times lower than on Earth the density of the air very roughly is three times bigger than the density that the air on Earth has when compressed to 1.5 bar the same as the pressure on Titan. That makes about ~4.5kg per cubic meter as opposed to ~1kg per cubic meter on earth. There will be significant deviations due to the nearness to the condensation point. (TODO: calculate Titans atmospheric density)

Titans air is so near to the condensation point that it can be liquefied via compression with just a plain (low temperature fortified) bicycle pump.

Resources

False color image of Titan. Big methane (CH₄) lakes on Titan. These are like giant minimal pre-processing resource molecule reservoirs for gemstone metamaterial technology. – Mosaic of images taken in near infrared light showing Titan’s polar seas (left) and a radar image of Kraken Mare (right), both taken by the Cassini spacecraft. Credit: NASA/JPL

Tholine dunes on Titan aka "star tar". This is believed to be a mix of organic molecules produced by UV chemistry the atmosphere. – The value as a resource seems questionable. Carbon can be obtained from the lakes in nicely packaged in methane molecules. Nitrogen can be obtained from the air. Also if heated this seemingly sand like stuff might melt and form a sticky gunk.

Titan is rich in hydrocarbons much of them are in the form of methane.
This is pretty much an ideal form for processing in an advanced nanofactory.
The methane lakes are basically seas of building material just like the atmosphere of Venus is.

• Carbon (and hydrogen) can be obtained from the methane in the lakes (or dunes - harder do disentangle that molecular mess).
• Nitrogen can be obtained from the air (or dunes - harder do disentangle that molecular mess).
• Oxygen (and hydrogen) can be obtained from water the "mountains" that presumably made out of a good part of water ice.
• Heavier elements might be quite scarce. What mechanisms kept them up at the surface? What mechanisms might bring them up again? Cryovolcanism?

In the outer solar system water is the most prevalent substance since oxygen and hydrogen are two of the most common elements in the universe and it is not hot enough that it evaporates into space. Water though does not make an ideal building material. It gets harder at very low temperatures but it still holds together just by weak hydrogen bonds. It's constituent atoms hydrogen and oxygen on their own can't be reconfigured into a stronger substance.

Transport

The ground might be soft moist and maybe even gunky at places. Combined with the low gravity normal walking and driving might prove to be difficult.
For fast transport diamondoid gem gum rails may be installed.

Low gravity (0.14g) and high "air" density makes flying very easy. Normal air isn't a lifting gas like on Venus though.

Airmeshes form an intermediate between rail systems and flying.

Habitation

Most important is good thermal isolation. For that some reversibly crushable atomically precise metamaterial is ideal.
Just like on earth vacuum balloons can be made. See: Robust metamaterial balloons

On titan space suits do not need do be overpressure-suits but with advanced gem gum suits that can provide normal levels of mobility even for over-pressure suits this doesn't matter much.

Water and oxygen can be taken from the environment just as organic material for food (bio-processing is not APM!).

For gravity keeping eyesight and bones healthy decently massive stable centrifuges are needed. Given sufficient energy advanced APM has the capacity to produce those quickly.

Energy

Solar

Titan receives very little light at Saturns distance from the sun. Then there is a haze layer high up in the atmosphere that filters even more from that light.

Autonomous solar energy collecting airships in high numbers could collect some energy for small initial colonies. While individually very low energy and slow combined they can provide useful levels of energy. This won't work for global scale colonization though.

Space solar energy import may be an option. Either locally with very big collectors of far from the inner solar system like e.g. excess energy reflected away from Venus. Quickly switchable planetary scale energy sources might cause difficult/dangerous situations though political and on political level and technical failure risk level.

Cemical

There's no free oxygen on Titan so conventional combustion engines on titan would work in reverse with oxygen that needs to be pre-produced. Instead of a combustion engine with advanced atomically precise technology one will do something different but for the sake of it let's look at how a combustion engine would work there. You'd need to carry around liquid oxygen (which does not need much chilling/pressurization at the present ambient temperatures) and burn it with the there omnipresent methane (the equivalent to air humidity on earth). The exhaust would ultimately produce a lot of snow and ice (water sand and gravel).

Some energy might have accumulated in the organic dunes of Titan from the high molecular weight organic compounds raining down from the upper atmosphere. There incoming UV light activates/splits methane & co which then can recombine in higher energetic forms. If this is enough to be usable it could provide energy for a while.

Wind

Some slight winds might concentrate the little solar energy that falls on Titan. Airmeshes could be of use.

Nuclear

Since energy is rather scarce on titan using nuclear energy sources is very tempting. But this is probably a rather bad choice. Titan has the excellent benefit of a thick atmosphere that shields perfectly against the harsh radiation of space. Combined with the fact that the ground mainly consists of light and thus predominantly non-radioactive elements Titan might have lower radiation levels than the natural levels on earth.

With Titans very active weather system radioactive spills will quickly spread on a global scale and thwart that unique benefit titan has to provide too us. Especially tritium seems bad. Liquid methane probably does not dissolve cesium and iodine very well which is good but tritium (radioactive hydrogen) when it doesn't fly around freely gets built in both the water and the hydrocarbons that is everywhere. Titan is rare of heavy elements so fuel for nuclear fission needs to be imported from somewhere. Possibly earth or later from metal asteroids of the main asteroid belt between mars and Jupiter.

One option is to produce energy with immature and unsafe nuclear technology safely in space and then import it down to titans surface chemically maybe via (many) space elevators.

Titan has lots of water and possibly also lithium (since it's a light element less prone to sink to the giants moon core) so nuclear fusion seems a natural choice. If the AP technology is at a level that makes 100% tritium tight fusion reactors possible then this may be fine.

Geothermal

There is enough tidal heating on titan that a global subsurface ocean is suspected. Maybe ~0°C (or somewhat colder due to salts) water "hot springs" can be tapped.

Fun / Sports

On titan with low gravity 0.14g and high density atmosphere 4.5kg/m^3 it should be possible for humans to fly just with muscle force. Going too high up and taking a dive might be dangerous though.

Related

• Colonization of the solar system

Other worlds with notable atmosphere

Other places with atmospheres thick enough to serve as a resource:
Venus, Mars, Gas giants, and of course Earth

Other ice worlds of high interest (none have significant atmosphere but some may have have an subsurface ocean).

• Ceres (in the asteroid belt)
• Callisto and Ganymede (moons of Jupiter – latter one has a bit high radiation levels)
• Triton (moon of Neptune) and many smaller bodies ...
• ... incuding Enceladus (highly cryovolcanically active moon of Saturn), and the biggest moons of Uranus.
• Transneptunian objects (TNOs) like the Pluto-Charon double-planet (not a normal planet – it's a dwarf planet now), Eris, ... , Haumea (spin flattened oddity), ...

Pluto (and probably many TNOs) actually has loads nitrogen "air". It's just so cold that it's pretty much totally frozen into a glacier.

Other ice worlds

Europa (Subsurface ocean bearing moon of Jupiter) is a radiation hellhole. Well not as bad as Io.
Getting there and then under the ice unharmed as a human will be difficult. Heavy shielding required.
Mass is exactly what you don't want ins space-travel.

External links

• Here is an article about Titan [1] by Fraser Cain (Universe Today)
• Wikipedia: Titan_(moon)
• Tholine "star-tar" space gunk – Wikipedia: Tholine

Planned dragonfly mission:

• Wikipedia: Dragonfly (spacecraft)
• NASA brief summary: https://www.nasa.gov/dragonfly/dragonfly-overview/index.html
• NASA: https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/missions/dragonfly/