Latitudinal Variation of Ammonia and Water Clouds in a Jupiter GCM

Details Latitudinal Variation of Ammonia and Water Clouds in a Jupiter GCM Latitudinal Variation of Ammonia and Water Clouds in a Jupiter GCM

Sep 2006

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006dps....38.0505p&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #38, #05.05; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 38, p.488

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We present results of our two- and three-dimensional simulations that investigate the latitudinal variation of ammonia and water clouds, using the EPIC model with an active hydrological cycle. Meridional plane simulations indicate that the zonal-wind structure under the visible cloud deck strongly affects the position of the cloud bases. In general, water clouds tend to be more uniform than the ammonia clouds, for which cloudy and cloud-free regions alternate frequently. The equatorial region shows the most activity, the rest of the domain shows only a small motion that makes the clouds more uniform in density. In these simulations a heavily precipitating water storm system often forms within a few degrees of the equator. It propagates in latitude in an organized fashion, raising the water cloud base and top dramatically to about the 2500 and 1000 mbar levels, respectively, and causing the ammonia cloud overhead to thicken. The time required for such storms to form is controlled by the initial deep abundance and saturation ratio. In general, the stability of the upper troposphere tends to stop large scale mixing between the ammonia and water clouds.
This research is funded by NASA's Planetary Atmospheres and Outer Planet Research Programs.

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