Near-Infrared Imaging of Titan's Surface and Tropospheric Clouds

Details Near-Infrared Imaging of Titan's Surface and Tropospheric Clouds Near-Infrared Imaging of Titan's Surface and Tropospheric Clouds

Nov 2001

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2001dps....33.5304b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS Meeting #33, #53.04; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 33, p.1135

Physics

Optics

Scientific paper

Using the AEOS 3.6 m telescope and adaptive optics system, we have acquired images of Titan through narrow-band filters between 890 nm and 1 μ m, on 6 nights between 6 November and 17 December 2000. At wavelengths of high methane opacity (890 nm and 1 μ m), images record only light scattered off Titan's stratospheric haze, which appears limb-brightened and zonally symmetric. Filters at 960 and 950 nm probe progressively deeper levels of Titan's atmosphere including light scattered in the troposphere. These tropospheric images reveal high contrast, zonally asymmetric features at high southern latitudes, which we interpret to be extensive regions of condensate clouds. These features are present on all 6 nights of observation, though the limited spatial resolution does not allow the lifetimes or motions of individual cloud masses to be determined with certainty. At 940 nm, between methane bands, images clearly include the contribution of these cloud masses, as well as surface albedo patterns. We will compare these results to those of previous imaging and spectroscopic studies of Titan's clouds and surface. The US Air Force provided the telescope time, on-site support and 80% of the research funds for this AFOSR and NSF jointly sponsored research under grant number NSF AST-0088643.

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