Xanadu radar images from Titan flyby T13

This image from the Synthetic Aperture Radar instrument on the Cassini spacecraft shows the radar-bright western margin of Xanadu, one of the most prominent features on Titan.

In radar images, bright regions indicate a rough or scattering material, while a dark region might be smoother or more absorbing. The image was taken during a flyby of Titan on April 30, 2006.
Narrow, sinuous, radar-bright channels, meandering like a maze, are seen on the right-hand-side of the image. These may be river networks that might have flowed onto the dark areas on the left of the image. Vast, dark areas covered by dunes are seen on the equatorial regions of Titan and have been referred to as Titan's "sand seas." Near the middle of the image is a radar-bright area that has a boundary with the dark sand seas. Because the radar illumination is coming from the top, this indicates that the bright region, Xanadu, is topographically higher than the sand seas.

This image from the Synthetic Aperture Radar instrument on the Cassini spacecraft shows the radar-bright region Xanadu and two circular features interpreted to be degraded impact craters. In radar images, bright regions indicate a rough or scattering material, while a dark region might be smoother or more absorbing. The image was acquired during a flyby of Titan on April 30, 2006.

Near the top of the image is a 70-kilometer-wide (47-mile-wide) impact structure. In contrast to a similarly sized crater called Sinlap, this crater shows a prominent central peak, indicating that the interaction between the impact and the crust was different in this region.

Near the bottom of the image is another circular feature with a dark central region that does not show evidence of a central peak. Numerous radar-bright channels cut across the image, indicating that liquids have flowed in this region.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter was designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The radar instrument was built by JPL and the Italian Space Agency, working with team members from the United States and several European countries.

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