Surface, Subsurface and Atmosphere Exchanges on the Satellites of the Outer Solar System

The surface morphology of icy moons is affected by several processes implicating exchanges between their subsurfaces and atmospheres (if any). The possible exchange of material between the subsurface and the surface is mainly determined by the mechanical properties of the lithosphere, which isolates the deep, warm and ductile ice material G. Tobie ( ) Laboratoire de Planétologie et Géodynamique de Nantes, Université Nantes Atlantique, 44322 Nantes Cedex 03, France e-mail: [email protected] G. Tobie CNRS, UMR-6112, 2, rue de la Houssinière, 44322 Nantes Cedex 03, France B. Giese German Aerospace Center, Institute of Planetary Research, Rutherfordstrasse 2, 12489 Berlin, Germany T.A. Hurford Planetary Systems Laboratory, NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA R.M. Lopes Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA F. Nimmo Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA F. Postberg Institute for Earth Sciences, Heidelberg University, Im Neuenheimer Feld 236, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany F. Postberg Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik (MPI for Nuclear Physics), Saupfercheckweg 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany K.D. Retherford Southwest Research Institute, 6220 Culebra Rd., San Antonio, TX 78228, USA