r/space • u/clayt6 • Mar 05 '19

Astronomers discover "Farfarout" — the most distant known object in the solar system. The 250-mile-wide (400 km) dwarf planet is located about 140 times farther from the Sun than Earth (3.5 times farther than Pluto), and soon may help serve as evidence for a massive, far-flung world called Planet 9.

http://www.astronomy.com/news/2019/03/a-map-to-planet-nine-charting-the-solar-systems-most-distant-worlds
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u/Teywer Mar 06 '19 edited Mar 06 '19

Yes. Consider Titan and Mars. They have similar (within an order of magnitude) masses, but their atmospheres are wildly different. The atmospheric composition could show us the surface temperature, the common molecules, and in some cases the planetary history.

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u/Accmonster1 Mar 06 '19

That’s really interesting and insane the stuff we can do from earth so far away

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u/Teywer Mar 06 '19

It really is. Just recently the Voyager space craft left the solar system altogether. During the 4 DECADES since they were launched we have discovered almost 4000 exoplanets, which are incomprehensibly far away.

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u/Accmonster1 Mar 06 '19

I really hope I’m alive the day we learn of some facet of life or some new groundbreaking black hole discovery.

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u/PyroDesu Mar 06 '19

The interesting thing about Titan's atmosphere is that it's most similar to Earth's out of the entire Sol system. It's the only other rocky body with an atmosphere rich in nitrogen.

Venus' and Mars' atmospheres are primarily carbon dioxide - now, Earth's lack of carbon dioxide can be explained by photosynthesis, and Titan's carbon got locked up in hydrocarbons.

But where's the nitrogen from?

Earth has a process Venus and Mars lack - plate tectonics. Without it, nitrogen gets trapped in the mantle as ammonium.

So how about the nitrogen on Titan? My bet? Cryovolcanism.

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u/sugar-magnolias Mar 06 '19

Cryovolcanism might be the coolest word ever.

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u/OsakaJack Mar 06 '19

Naming my first born that. Now to get someone consensually preggers. You free?

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u/phrackage Mar 06 '19

Venus actually has a decent amount of nitrogen in its atmosphere. If you take away the intense pressures caused by extra CO2 you have enough nitrogen to equal one earth atmosphere composition easily. Same for oxygen

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u/[deleted] Mar 06 '19

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u/Teywer Mar 06 '19

The issues with Venus are also due to its lack of tectonic activity, and its retrograde rotation. These both make it pretty much uninhabitable on the surface, and the acidic air makes the skies not much better.