Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Planetary science

Arrow in Titan's sky

Subjects

An exotic arrow-shaped cloud was discovered in the atmosphere of Saturn's moon Titan last year. Numerical modelling shows how a large-scale atmospheric wave can naturally shape tropical clouds to such an arrow.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Cloud in Titan's tropics.

NASA/JPL/SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE

References

  1. Turtle, E. P. et al. Geophys. Res. Lett. 38, L03203 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Mitchell, J. L., Ádámkovics, M., Caballero, R. & Turtle, E. P. Nature Geosci. 4, 589–592 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Brown, M. E., Bouchez, A. H. & Griffith, C. A. Nature 420, 795–797 (2002).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Rodriguez, S. et al. Nature 459, 678–682 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Griffith, C. A. et al. Science 310, 474–477 (2005).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Schaller, E. L., Roe., H. G., Schneider, T. & Brown, M. E. Nature 460, 873–875 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Turtle, E. P. et al. Science 331, 1414–1417 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Langhans, M. H. et al. Planet. Space Sci. 10.1016/j.pss.2011.01.020 (2011).

  9. Dollfus, A. J. Atmos. Sci. 32, 1060–1070 (1975).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Smith, M. D., Gierasch, P. J. & Schinder, P. J. Science 256, 652–655 (1992).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Tetsuya Tokano.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Tokano, T. Arrow in Titan's sky. Nature Geosci 4, 582–583 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1236

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1236

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing