Alexander G. Hayes, assistant professor of astronomy, first began studying Titan as a graduate student, Hayes' research is described in this Cornell Research story.
“Where else can you say it’s raining right now, other than on Earth?” Hayes says in the story about Saturn’s largest moon. “It has strikingly similar processes acting on its surface, generating landforms including lakes, channels, and dunes—everything you have here, you have there. Titan’s methane-based hydrologic system works just like Earth’s water cycle, but does so in a completely alien environment.”
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Arizona State Univ./Space Systems Loral/Peter Rubin
An artist's-concept illustration depicting the spacecraft of NASA's Psyche mission near the mission's target, the metal asteroid Psyche. Psyche Mission PI Lindy Elkins-Tanton will speak at Cornell Sept. 11.