A giant, glassy lake larger than North America's Lake Ontario graces the south pole of Saturn's largest moon Titan, new research confirms. "This is the first observation that really pins down that Titan has a surface lake filled with liquid," said lead researcher Robert Brown of the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary laboratory in Tucson. Called Ontario Lacus, the lake extends 235 kilometers and covers an area of about 20,000 square kilometers. The lake is filled mostly with methane and ethane, hydrocarbons that are gases on Earth but liquid on the bone-chilling surface of Titan. The finding, detailed in the July 31 issue of the journal Nature, is yet another major discovery about Titan, which has become one of the most fascinating bodies in the solar system for exploring environments that may give rise to life.
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