Comment on "Evidence of electrical activity on Titan drawn from the Schumann resonances sent by Huygens probe" by J.A. Morente, J.A. Portí, A. Salinas, E.A. Navarro [doi: 10.1016/j.icarus.2008.02.004]

Michel Hamelin (1) , R. Grard (2) , J.J. López-Moreno (3) , K. Schwingenschuh (4) , Christian Béghin (5) , Jean-Jacques Berthelier (1) , F. Simões

1 PLANETO - LATMOS
2 RSSD - Research and Scientific Support Department, ESTEC
3 IAA - Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía
4 IWF - Space Research Institute of Austrian Academy of Sciences
5 LPCE - Laboratoire de physique et chimie de l'environnement

Morente et al. [J.A. Morente, J.A. Portí, A. Salinas, E.A. Navarro, 2008. Icarus, doi: 10.1016/j.icarus.2008.02.004] have recently presented a new analysis of the Permittivity, Wave and Altimetry (PWA) measurements made during the descent of the Huygens Probe through the atmosphere of Titan. They claimed the identification of several Schumann resonance harmonics and concluded in favor of a lightning activity on Titan. We report here several reasons for not endorsing this paper.

Mots clés: Titan; Lightning; Ionospheres; Instrumentation

Domaines: Planète et Univers [physics]

Michel Hamelin, R. Grard, J.J. López-Moreno, K. Schwingenschuh, Christian Béghin, et al.. Comment on "Evidence of electrical activity on Titan drawn from the Schumann resonances sent by Huygens probe" by J.A. Morente, J.A. Portí, A. Salinas, E.A. Navarro [doi: 10.1016/j.icarus.2008.02.004]. Icarus, 2009, 204 (1), pp.349. ⟨10.1016/j.icarus.2009.01.031⟩. ⟨hal-00584279⟩