Other
Scientific paper
May 2002
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002agusmsa21a..05s&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2002, abstract #SA21A-05
Other
0305 Aerosols And Particles (0345, 4801), 0341 Middle Atmosphere: Constituent Transport And Chemistry (3334), 0355 Thermosphere: Composition And Chemistry, 0360 Transmission And Scattering Of Radiation
Scientific paper
In August, 1997 the Middle Atmosphere High Resolution Spectrograph Investigation (MAHRSI) and the Cryogenic Infrared Spectrometers and Telescopes for the Atmosphere (CRISTA) flew for eight days on a satellite deployed and retrieved by the space shuttle. CRISTA measurements include the infrared emission of water ice from polar mesospheric clouds (PMCs) near 12 microns while MAHRSI measured PMCs from solar scattered light simultaneously with OH solar resonance fluorescence at 309 nm. Above about 65 km, OH is produced from water vapor photodissociation by solar ultraviolet radiation so that OH can be used as a proxy for water vapor in this altitude region. The two instruments scanned the limb of the Earth at latitudes up to 71 N where they both observed a concentrated region of late-season PMCs appear over northern North America near the end of the mission. Using the space shuttle ascent trajectory, the MAHRSI OH observations to help infer the path of the water vapor exhaust and a 1-dimensional photochemical model, the photodissociation of the water vapor is calculated as it is transported northward, downward and eastward around the pole to North America. It is found that the water remaining upon nucleation is consistent with the amount directly inferred from the CRISTA ice observations to within the uncertainty of the measurements. The observations indicate, therefore, that a layer of PMCs can be formed by a reservoir of extremely concentrated water vapor injected into the lower thermosphere by the shuttle at low latitudes. The Student Nitric Oxide Explorer (SNOE) has scanned the limb of the Earth near 215 nm at all latitudes in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere since its launch in 1998. Using results from a microphysical model of PMC growth under the special conditions indicated by the MAHRSI/CRISTA observations and data from SNOE, we will search for other examples of PMCs from launch vehicle exhaust.
Bailey Scott M.
Englert Christoph R.
Grossmann Kay
Gumbel Jörg
Rapp Michael
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