Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques, Universités Paris Est Créteil & Paris Diderot, UMR CNRS 7583, IPSL, 61 Avenue Général de Gaulle, 94010 Créteil Cedex, France.
Chem Soc Rev. 2012 Aug 21;41(16):5380-93. doi: 10.1039/c2cs35014a. Epub 2012 Apr 5.
Titan, the largest satellite of Saturn, is the only one in the solar system with a dense atmosphere. Mainly composed of dinitrogen with several % of methane, this atmosphere experiences complex organic processes, both in the gas and aerosol phases, which are of prebiotic interest and within an environment of astrobiological interest. This tutorial review presents the different approaches which can be followed to study such an exotic place and its chemistry: observation, theoretical modeling and experimental simulation. It describes the Cassini-Huygens mission, as an example of observational tools, and gives the new astrobiologically oriented vision of Titan which is now available by coupling the three approaches. This includes the many analogies between Titan and the Earth, in spite of the much lower temperature in the Saturn system, the complex organic chemistry in the atmosphere, from the gas to the aerosol phases, but also the potential organic chemistry on Titan's surface, and in its possible internal water ocean.
泰坦，土星最大的卫星，是太阳系中唯一拥有浓厚大气层的卫星。它的大气层主要由氮气组成，其中含有少量的甲烷，这种大气层经历了复杂的有机过程，无论是在气相还是在气溶胶相中，都具有前生物的意义，并且处于天体生物学感兴趣的环境中。本教程综述介绍了研究这种奇特环境及其化学性质的不同方法：观测、理论建模和实验模拟。它描述了卡西尼-惠更斯任务，作为观测工具的一个例子，并通过结合这三种方法，给出了现在可用的、具有新天体生物学导向的泰坦的新视野。这包括了泰坦与地球之间的许多相似之处，尽管在土星系统中温度要低得多，大气层中的复杂有机化学从气相到气溶胶相，但也包括了泰坦表面以及其可能的内部水海洋中的潜在有机化学。
