This year’s conference will feature the following special sessions:

Special Session on Celebrating Cassini:  The Cassini spacecraft’s 13-year mission in the Saturn system, covering nearly half of a Saturn year, has come to an end. LPSC is at a perfect time and is a wonderful venue to celebrate the remarkable legacy of Cassini with invited and contributed talks and posters, covering science from the many disciplines of this mission. This session will highlight the rings, Saturn, Titan, and the icy moons. The session will focus on new results covering the final year of the mission, as well as seasonal changes and inter-instrument and inter-body comparisons.

Special Session on the Taurus-Littrow Valley 45 Years After Apollo 17:  Forty-five years ago, Apollo 17 explored the Taurus-Littrow Valley. This session will re-explore Taurus-Littrow, from what has been learned from samples, to the analyses of remotely sensed data. Abstracts may include topics such as origin, structure, and stratigraphy of the valley; modern analysis of ALSEP data; pyroclastic deposits and their implications for lunar origin; sources and nature of impact breccia clasts; isotopic dating results and issues; regolith formation processes and history; mare and pre-mare volcanism and cooling histories; thrust faults and their global implications; and avalanche and debris flow origins and dynamics.

Special Session on 21st Century Venus:  Atmosphere to Surface:  This special session will highlight the latest discoveries from active, recent, and completed missions, ground-based astronomy, the laboratory, and continued work on Venus data in hand. The session also seeks to highlight open questions that can be addressed by future and especially near-term missions from a variety of platforms.