Search Publications
Probing the extreme planetary atmosphere of WASP-12b
Showman, Adam P.; Swain, Mark; Kawahara, Hajime +7 more
We report near-infrared measurements of the terminator region transmission spectrum and dayside emission spectrum of the exoplanet WASP-12b obtained using the HST WFC3 instrument. The disk-average dayside brightness temperature averages about 2900 K, peaking to 3200 K around 1.46 µm. We modeled a range of atmospheric cases for both the emiss…
Annual survey of water vapor vertical distribution and water-aerosol coupling in the martian atmosphere observed by SPICAM/MEx solar occultations
Forget, F.; Maltagliati, L.; Montmessin, F. +5 more
The vertical distribution of water vapor is a very important diagnostic to determine the physical and chemical processes that drive the martian water cycle. Yet, very few direct measurements have been performed so far, and our knowledge of the H2O vertical distribution on Mars relies on General Circulation Models (GCMs). The study prese…
Titan’s surface and atmosphere from Cassini/VIMS data with updated methane opacity
Le Mouélic, S.; Rodriguez, S.; Lellouch, E. +13 more
We present an analysis of Titan data acquired by the Cassini Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS), making use of recent improvements in methane spectroscopic parameters in the region 1.3-5.2 µm. We first analyzed VIMS spectra covering a 8 × 10-km2 area near the Huygens landing site in order to constrain the single scatt…
Cloud level winds from the Venus Express Monitoring Camera imaging
Roatsch, Th.; Ignatiev, N. I.; Markiewicz, W. J. +7 more
Six years of continuous monitoring of Venus by European Space Agency’s Venus Express orbiter provides an opportunity to study dynamics of the atmosphere our neighbor planet. Venus Monitoring Camera (VMC) on-board the orbiter has acquired the longest and the most complete so far set of ultra violet images of Venus. These images enable a study the c…
The escape of heavy atoms from the ionosphere of HD209458b. II. Interpretation of the observations
Yelle, R. V.; Lavvas, P.; Koskinen, T. T. +1 more
Transits in the H I 1216 Å (Lyman α), O I 1334 Å, C II 1335 Å, and Si III 1206.5 Å lines constrain the properties of the upper atmosphere of HD209458b. In addition to probing the temperature and density profiles in the thermosphere, they have implications for the properties of the lower atmosphere. Fits to the observations with a simple empirical …
Dynamics of Saturn’s great storm of 2010-2011 from Cassini ISS and RPWS
West, Robert A.; Porco, Carolyn C.; Dyudina, Ulyana A. +6 more
Saturn’s quasi-periodic planet-encircling storms are the largest convecting cumulus outbursts in the Solar System. The last eruption was in 1990 (Sánchez-Lavega, A. [1994]. Chaos 4, 341-353). A new eruption started in December 2010 and presented the first-ever opportunity to observe such episodic storms from a spacecraft in orbit around Saturn (Fi…
Crater-based dating of geological units on Mars: Methods and application for the new global geological map
Tanaka, Kenneth L.; Platz, Thomas; Michael, Gregory +2 more
The new, post-Viking generation of Mars orbital imaging and topographical data provide significant higher-resolution details of surface morphologies, which induced a new effort to photo-geologically map the surface of Mars at 1:20,000,000 scale. Although from unit superposition relations a relative stratigraphical framework can be compiled, it was…
Reflectance spectra diversity of silica-rich materials: Sensitivity to environment and implications for detections on Mars
Bell, J. F.; Rice, M. S.; Horgan, B. H. +7 more
Hydrated silica-rich materials have recently been discovered on the surface of Mars by the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) Spirit, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM), and the Mars Express Observatoire pour la Minéralogie, l’Eau, les Glaces, et l’Activité (OMEGA) in several locations. Hav…
One Moon, Many Measurements 3: Spectral reflectance
Yokota, Y.; Mall, U.; Besse, S. +9 more
Remote-sensing datasets obtained by each instrument aboard Selenological and Engineering Explorer (SELENE) and Chandrayaan-1 have not been compared directly, and the characteristics of each instrument’s data, which may reflect the observation conditions of each instrument and/or residual error in instrument calibration, are unknown. This paper des…
The thermal structure of Titan’s upper atmosphere, I: Temperature profiles from Cassini INMS observations
Wahlund, J. -E.; Edberg, N. J. T.; Ågren, K. +3 more
We derive vertical temperature profiles from Ion Neutral Mass Spectrometer (INMS) N2 density measurements from 32 Cassini passes. We find that the average temperature of Titan’s thermosphere varies significantly from pass-to-pass between 112 and 175 K. The temperatures from individual temperature profiles also varies considerably, with …