Still, it could be down there, he says, and against the odds make its way to the surface in the ice lavas (Science, 8 April 2005, p. 193) first recognized by the Cassini radar.
Released earlier this year, this inventive game involves slicing through ice and lava on behalf of a cute mammoth character – and learning fractions along the way.
In addition, some land surfaces (such as snow, ice and lava) have similar reflectance characteristics to those of water, which means that water-detection algorithms need to be developed and calibrated carefully.
Nintendo EAD, the game's closeted, Tokyo-based crack team of inventors may have retreated from the buckshot heavens once explored in the Wii's Super Mario Galaxy titles, settling once again on terra firma (even if, predictably enough, it's often covered in ice or lava) – but what a world.
The bottle ship she explores is as intricately designed as previous Metroid environments, thanks in part to the chameleonic, virtual-reality interiors, with clanking metal walkways transforming into ice floes, lava pits and dense, humid jungles at the touch of a computer terminal.
This can include fire, electricity, ice, quicksand, lava, black-holes, dark matter, poison, and even jumping.
"Ice-filled lava tubes on Mauna Loa," the study states, "illustrate that cave ice can be found in extreme geographic isolation, and in geologic environments similar to those of Mars, where many lava tubes have been observed".
The ice-contact lava confinement surfaces are also associated with zones of distinctive open cavities in the lavas that range from about 1 m to several metres across.
The ice-marginal lava flows reach thicknesses of up to 100 m.
