Indicating and Recording the Tides

The tides of Titan.

We have detected in Cassini spacecraft data the signature of the periodic tidal stresses within Titan, driven by the eccentricity (e = 0.028) of its 16-day orbit around Saturn. Precise measurements of the acceleration of Cassini during six close flybys between 2006 and 2011 have revealed that Titan responds to the variable tidal field exerted by Saturn with periodic changes of its quadrupole gr...

The Tides of EDA

IT WAS A GREAT HONOR to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Design Automation Conference with a keynote lecture intended to place in perspective the most relevant research results presented at DAC in all these years and to identify trends and challenges for the future of electronic design automation (EDA). Going through the DAC proceedings, hunting for relevant papers, was indeed a formidable...

Moon, tides and climate

1 by laser reflectors left there by astronauts. What does this motion have to do with the ocean circulation? By Kepler's laws, the recession implies that there is a continuing loss of energy in the Earth–Moon system of 3 ǂ10 12 watts, or 3 terawatts, mostly in the ocean. But where in the ocean does this energy go, and what are its effects? On page 775 of this issue, Egbert and Ray 2 produce evi...

Tides and the evolution of planetary habitability.

Tides raised on a planet by the gravity of its host star can reduce the planet's orbital semi-major axis and eccentricity. This effect is only relevant for planets orbiting very close to their host stars. The habitable zones of low-mass stars are also close in, and tides can alter the orbits of planets in these locations. We calculate the tidal evolution of hypothetical terrestrial planets arou...

Tides in the Weddell Sea