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Second Workshop on ‘Titan - Observations, Experiments, Computations, and 
Modeling’ Miami, Florida, March 24-26, 2008  

 

Saturn’s moon Titan is the only solar system body besides Earth with a thick atmosphere and is widely considered as a natural laboratory on the planetary scale to 
understand the prebiotic che­mis­try on proto-Earth. The Cassini-Huygens mission to Titan has opened a new chapter in Solar System exploration and extraterrestrial
atmospheric chemistry. On January 14, 2005, the Huygens probe successfully descended through the atmosphere of Titan and safely landed on its surface. An 
extraordinary new world has been unveiled. The scientific data are currently being archived and analyzed, but the chemistry is far from being understood. This 
workshop is part of the NSF-Collaborative Research in Chemistry (CRC) Network "Chemistry of Unsaturated Hydrocarbons in Titan's Atmosphere” and the 
second in a series of annual meetings aimed to better understand the chemistry taking place in the atmosphere and on the surface of Titan. It brings together 
atmospheric modelers, astronomical observers, mission specialists, planetary scientists, phy­­si­cal chemists (dynamics, kinetics, photochemistry), theoreticia
ns (electronic struc­ture, dyna­mics calculations), astrobiologists, and or­ganic chemists (hydro­car­bon and nitrile che­mis­try). By exploring the current boundar
ies of planetary science and chemical know­ledge, we can more effectively design new laboratory experiments under well-defined con­ditions (and recommen
d promising directions for further observational searches) and upcoming Solar System missions to resolve hitherto unanswered aspects of molecular syn­the­sis 
in the Solar System. 

 

The workshop features invited (40 min + 10 min discussion) as well as 
contributed talks (15 min + 5 min discussion) and is limited to 50 
participants. Regis­tra­ti­­on forms, meeting site information, and 
abstracts are available online 
(http://www.chem.hawaii.edu/Bil301/Titan2008.html) (deadline: De­cem­ber 
31, 2007). For addi­ti­onal questions, please email to [log in to unmask] 
<mailto:[log in to unmask]>. The registration site opens September 1, 2007.

 

We are looking forward to seeing you in Miami.

 

The Organizers

 

Ralf I. Kaiser, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Alexander M. Mebel, Florida International University

Ian R. Sims, Universite de Rennes 1

Arthur G. Suits, Wayne State University