A Radiative Seasonal Climate Model of Saturn's Atmosphere

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy

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Scientific paper

The continued procurement of both Cassini data and ground based, high spectral resolution observations have resulted in a boom in planetary atmospheric research on Saturn. The influx of data indicates a need for the re-evaluation of existing radiative seasonal climate models and the development of new, more detailed ones. The 27o axial tilt of Saturn is responsible for seasonal climate variability, similar to the Earth. Hydrocarbon emission strengths have been observed to vary with latitude, due to the meridional heterogeneity of both stratospheric temperatures and abundances of the observed hydrocarbon species (Greathouse et al., 2005). Data obtained by Greathouse et al., 2005 with the Texas Echelon Cross Echelle Spectrograph, mounted on the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility in Hawaii, allowed them to infer a 10 K increase in stratospheric temperature from the equator to the south pole in September 2002, very near Saturn's summer solstice. A repeat of the observations in 2004 showed that the temperature gradient between the equator to pole had increased from 10 to 15 K. These observations show that Saturn's stratospheric temperature lags the seasonal forcing by at least two years. The Saturnian seasonal climate model of Bezard and Gautier (Icarus 61, 296-310, 1985) appears to correctly predict the magnitude of the latitudinal seasonal variation of temperature, but their anticipated timing is off. This inconsistency could be due to their assumed hydrocarbon abundance homogeneity or the fact that they did not include aerosol scattering in their model. We have revised the calculations of Bezard and Gautier (1985) and implemented hydrocarbon abundance profiles that vary with season and latitude. Here we present our first model predictions of the seasonal thermal variations of Saturn.
This work is sponsored by the Lunar and Planetary Institute.

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