Titan, Mars and Earth : Entropy production by latitudinal heat transport

Temperature contrasts between warm tropics and cool high latitudes depends on how eciently heat is transported by the atmosphere (and oceans) from the trop- ics. This heat transport is generally assumed to be pro- portional to atmospheric pressure, but we show with a sim- ple model that this prediction fails by orders of magnitude for Mars and Titan. However, a basic principle, previously postulated for the Earth, does successfully predict the heat flows and zonal temperatures of Mars and Titan. The cir- culation predicted by this Maximum Entropy Production (MEP) principle is consistent with Titan's observed zonal structure and the winds and CO2 frost cycle on Mars. The principle makes powerful predictions where detailed infor- mationislacking,suchasontheearlyEarthandonpossibly habitable extrasolar planets.

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