MCS Observations of Ice and Dust Layering

Details MCS Observations of Ice and Dust Layering MCS Observations of Ice and Dust Layering

Oct 2010

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2010dps....42.3006b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #42, #30.06; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 42, p.1028

Computer Science

Sound

Scientific paper

Mars Climate Sounder (MCS) on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has collected limb observations starting in September 2006. MCS is a nine channel infrared radiometer with limb staring arrays optimized for atmospheric sounding. Retrievals have been performed on the observations to produce vertical profiles of temperature, dust opacity and water ice opacity, extending from the surface to 80 km. The limb sounding geometry is sensitive to very modest layers of dust and ice due to the factor of 50 increase in the path length compared to nadir sounding.
The sensitive MCS profiles show that at many seasons, a layer of ice is seen above the bulk of the dust in the atmosphere. A moderate or thin layer of ice (with visible column opacities << 0.2) forms a cap above the dust. The structure of the dust is often complex and rarely well mixed, and often shows a concentration or layer at some seasons. For a number of seasons, we map the ice and dust by opacity, altitude, number of layers, distance between ice and dust layers, and broadness of the layers.
We investigate the spatial and temporal distributions of the most common ice and dust configurations in these categories to better understand the relationship between ice and dust in the Martian atmosphere. We examine both the daytime and nighttime distribution and the changes between the two local times. The ice is likely to play a role in controlling the vertical distribution of dust in the atmosphere at the seasons where it is present.
Work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, was performed under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

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