Ricerc@Sapienza

In January 2015 (fly-by T108), the Cassini radar observed Punga Mare, Titan's northernmost and third large sea, in altimetry mode during closest approach. The ground track intercepted a section of the mare and a system of channels and flooded areas connecting Punga to Kraken Mare. We use a processing technique, succesfully adopted for Ligeia Mare and Ontario Lacus, for detecting echoes from the seafloor and constraining the depth and composition of these liquid bodies. We find that, along the radar transect, Punga Mare has a maximum measured depth of 110 m.

The Cassini RADAR altimeter has provided broad-scale surface topography data for Saturn's largest moon Titan. Herein, we adapt the delay/Doppler algorithm to take into account Cassini geometries and antenna mispointing usually occurring during hyperbolic Titan flybys. The proposed algorithm allows up to tenfold improvement in the along-track resolution. Preliminary results are provided that show how the improved topography presented herein can advance our understanding of Titan's surface characteristics.