The origin of the CN radical in cometary atmospheres: a review of observations and models.

Details The origin of the CN radical in cometary atmospheres: a review of observations and models. The origin of the CN radical in cometary atmospheres: a review of observations and models.

Apr 2003

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2003eaeja.....5051f&link_type=abstract

EGS - AGU - EUG Joint Assembly, Abstracts from the meeting held in Nice, France, 6 - 11 April 2003, abstract #5051

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The CN radical is one of the first species detected in cometary environment at the end of the XIXth century. Nevertheless it is still unclear whether CN is produced entirely by the photodissociation of HCN or also by an another process. In order to constrain the formation process of the CN radical, we have compiled CN and HCN production rates and CN Haser scale lengths. The CN and HCN production rates are compared for different comets taking into account that theses values are model dependent. The formation and destruction scale lengths have been corrected from the variation of the solar flux and then fitted as a function of the heliocentric distance. We find that they slightly depend on the solar flux. Then the average value of the formation scale length at 1 AU has been compared with the photodissociation rate of HCN and others possible parent molecules. It seems that the production process of CN radical changes with the heliocentric distance. At greater distance than 2.5 au from the sun, the CN radical could be entirely produced by the photodissociation of HCN. Nevertheless at lower distance from the sun, a minor part is surely produced by an other process. To date, this additional process can not be surely determined, but its kinetics has to be faster than the photodissociation of HCN in order to explain the observed CN formation scale length. We suggest that it could be direct production of CN radical from solid molecules present on cometary grains by photo or thermal degradation.

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