An Overview of Ultraviolet Through Infrared Reflectance Observations of Mercury during the Second Messenger Flyby.

Details An Overview of Ultraviolet Through Infrared Reflectance Observations of Mercury during the Second Messenger Flyby. An Overview of Ultraviolet Through Infrared Reflectance Observations of Mercury during the Second Messenger Flyby.

Dec 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008agufm.u11c..05i&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2008, abstract #U11C-05

Mathematics

Logic

1060 Planetary Geochemistry (5405, 5410, 5704, 5709, 6005, 6008), 3672 Planetary Mineralogy And Petrology (5410), 3934 Optical, Infrared, And Raman Spectroscopy, 5400 Planetary Sciences: Solid Surface Planets, 6235 Mercury

Scientific paper

During the second MESSENGER flyby of Mercury on October 6, 2008, MESSENGER will pass over part of the planet previously imaged by the Mariner 10 spacecraft. The Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS) will obtain the first high-spatial-resolution (< 10 km) spectra of this hemisphere, measuring reflectance spectra from Mercury's surface over the wavelength range 220-1450 nm along an equatorial swath from approximately 285 to 360 degrees E. The Visible and Infrared Spectrograph (VIRS) sensor of MASCS, sensitive to wavelengths of 350-1450 nm, will observe the sunlit surface for approximately 8 minutes after the spacecraft passes over Mercury's dawn terminator and will obtain approximately 400 reflectance spectra, about 50 of which will be contemporaneous and co-aligned with Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) Wide Angle Camera color images. MASCS VIRS spectra will sample footprints averaging several kilometers across. MASCS also will obtain five ground spectra in the middle ultraviolet (UV, 220-320 nm) and one discovery scan in the far UV (115-170 nm) using the MASCS Ultraviolet and Visible Spectrometer (UVVS) component in a surface-viewing mode. The UVVS component of MASCS is a scanning grating spectrometer capable of observing one wavelength at a time, so each UVVS spectrum will be spread over a swath of surface area. The MDIS Narrow Angle Camera at higher resolution will image the entire MASCS ground track subsequently. Several days after the flyby, MASCS will look back at the planet to obtain disk-integrated spectra for VIRS and UVVS with Mercury as a near-point source. The MASCS ground track from the first flyby of Mercury in January 2008 crossed a variety of cratered and plains units, revealing a red-sloped, space-weathered surface with only modest spectral variation, and very little indication of the 1- micron absorption band indicative of iron in silicate minerals. Absorption features between 200 and 400 nm in several resolved spectra as well as in the disk-integrated Mercury spectrum indicated the possibility of Fe-Ti minerals on the surface. The ground-track of the second flyby will cross more cratered plains units, including at least one multi-ringed basin viewable with illumination at moderate to low incidence angle. We compare equatorial spectra from the two hemispheres, and we relate them to color images and inferred geologic units.

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