Cassini FUV Spectral Properties of Saturn's Rings

Details Cassini FUV Spectral Properties of Saturn's Rings Cassini FUV Spectral Properties of Saturn's Rings

Sep 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009dps....41.1802b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #41, #18.02

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Spectra taken by the Cassin Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph (UVIS) of Saturn's C ring, B ring, Cassini Division, and A ring have been analyzed in order to characterize ring particle regolith properties, water ice abundance in the rings, and macroscopic scattering properties. Spectra of the normalized reflectance (I/F) in all four regions show a characteristic water ice absorption feature near 1650 Å. Using only the spectral shape of the water ice absorption feature, a modified Hapke model and Shkuratov model were used to determine the asymmetry parameter and photon mean path length for the regolith associated with ice grains on ring particles. Both models assume multiple scattering between regolith grains on a given ring particle. Retrieved values of the single scattering asymmetry parameter show the regolith grains to be highly backscattering in the FUV spectral regime. Retrieved values of the photon mean path length show a strong correlation with ring brightness in the C ring but are anti-correlated with ring brightness from the inner B ring through the outer A ring. The UV slope of 1800/1500 Å (reflectance outside the water absorption ratioed to that inside the absorption band) shows that the fractional abundance of surface water ice is largest in the outer B ring and decreases by over a factor of 2 across the inner C ring. Under a single scattering assumption, we are analyzing the data to look at the ring particle phase function and albedo for measurements over a range of phase angles and will present those results.

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