Other
Scientific paper
Dec 2008
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008agufm.p32b..06s&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2008, abstract #P32B-06
Other
0738 Ice (1863), 1640 Remote Sensing (1855), 6225 Mars
Scientific paper
Results from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Shallow Radar (SHARAD) instrument indicate the presence of a subsurface interface in the Phoenix Landing Site region. In an effort to characterize the site prior to landing, numerous SHARAD observations were made over the Phoenix landing ellipse and the surrounding region. While our initial analysis of these observations did not show clear evidence of subsurface returns, refinement of data processing techniques has allowed us to see an apparent subsurface discontinuity which extends throughout much of the topographic depression known as "Green Valley" in which the lander resides. Coincidentally, the Phoenix spacecraft landed in the area of greatest confidence for this subsurface detection. We will present a series of SHARAD radar observations showing the nature and extent of the detected interface and will discuss how it may be related to observations of the surface from the lander and from other orbiting instruments. It should be noted that SHARAD depth resolution is ~ 8 meters and is not sufficient to resolve the unit that Phoenix's instruments are investigating. However, the shallow surface composition and geometry is encoded in the radar surface echoes. The SHARAD instrument, provided by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) to NASA's MRO mission, is a wide-band (15Ð25 MHz), nadir-looking radar that provides surface altimetry and subsurface structure, the latter in areas where the radar wave penetrates the surface and is reflected from a dielectric discontinuity. SHARAD operates at a center frequency of 20 MHz, has a compositionally dependent depth resolution of ~5--10 m, and a footprint of ~1--2 km (reducible in processing to 300 m in the along-track direction). At Mars, subsurface returns from SHARAD have been identified in areas known or believed to be predominantly water ice (e.g., the Polar Layered Deposits and mid-latitude lobate debris aprons) as well as those of materials considered to be of volcanic origin (e.g., Medusa Fossae and Amazonis Planitia).
Biccari Daniela
Holt Jackie
Nunes Diana
Phillips Raquel
Plaut Jeffrey J.
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