Contributions to the Development of the S.E.T.U.P. (Experimental and Theoretical Simulations Useful for Planetology) Project

Details Contributions to the Development of the S.E.T.U.P. (Experimental and Theoretical Simulations Useful for Planetology) Project Contributions to the Development of the S.E.T.U.P. (Experimental and Theoretical Simulations Useful for Planetology) Project

Sep 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009dps....41.3001a&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #41, #30.01

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

This paper presents studies performed in the frame of the SETUP program (a French acronym for Experimental and Theoretical Simulations Useful for Planetology) which final goal is to be able to determine the physico-chemical processes involved in Titan's atmosphere.
The chemical evolution of its atmosphere is driven by electrons coming from Saturn's magnetosphere, and by solar UV photons, mainly lyman-alpha radiation. The SETUP program plans to perform representative simulations of Titan's atmosphere in a reactor where electron dissociation of N2 and photodissociation of CH4 will be initiated. Then, the complex chemistry between N atoms and CH3, CH2, CH fragments will be followed thanks to in situ time resolved CRDS technique.
Concerning methane's photolysis, we are planning to use either a continuous H2/He photochemical lamp delivering photons at 121,6 nm or a pulsed excimer KrF laser delivering photons at 248 nm. The last case implies a multiphotonic process. Such pulsed photolysis is a way to get kinetic data in order to better characterize the chemical mechanisms involved.
One has to note that the available literature provides contradictory results for methane's primary photolytic scheme at Lyman-alpha and no studies at all have been performed yet to establish the different photolytic decomposition pathways at 248 nm.
Thus, experimental studies have been carried out in order to compare methane photolysis at 121.6 nm and 248 nm.
In parallel, a zero dimension photochemical model has been developed and adapted to simulate methane photolysis at both wavelengths.
The theoretical results have been compared to experimental ones. From this work some information about chemical mechanisms following both types of photolysis have been retrieved showing that primary products obtained at these two wavelengths are different. These results and their implication on the development of the experimental program will be presented.

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