The Martian atmosphere above great volcanoes: Early planetary Fourier spectrometer observations

Details The Martian atmosphere above great volcanoes: Early planetary Fourier spectrometer observations The Martian atmosphere above great volcanoes: Early planetary Fourier spectrometer observations

Aug 2005

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2005p%26ss...53.1053g&link_type=abstract

Planetary and Space Science, Volume 53, Issue 10, p. 1053-1064.

Physics

10

Scientific paper

This work reports the first observations of the Martian atmosphere returned by the planetary Fourier spectrometer (PFS) on board of Mars express (MEX) satellite in the vicinity of the greatest volcanic domes of the planet. Two of the early MEX orbits have already covered the region of Olympus Mons and Ascraeus Mons. These measurements are very similar in terms of local time (14LT) and season (L=337 and 342, respectively). The long wavelength channel (LWC) of the instrument works in the thermal IR (300 1500 cm-1); its data allow the simultaneous retrieval of surface temperature, integrated content of water ice and dust suspended in the atmosphere and air thermal field up to an altitude of about 50 km. Results of the code described in the companion paper by Grassi et al. for the two orbits are presented and compared with the state expected by the European Martian climate dataset v3.1. The parent global circulation model LMD-Oxford-AAS is able to take into account a wide number of physical phenomena, but the results included in EMCD are affected by a relatively coarse spatial resolution, that does not properly describe the great volcanic domes. The comparison demonstrated that observed data follow quite strictly the trends foreseen by the model in low altitude regions, while the behavior shows remarkable differences above the relief, where orography likely plays an important role. Namely, extended mid-altitude minima in air temperature fields above the summit of volcanic domes are observed. The integrated content of dust shows a minima above Olympus, as expected for a dust particle concentration that decays with height. Measurements are consistent with an exponential decay characterized by a scale height of ˜10 km. Consistently, the surface temperature presents a maxima over the dome, as expected for conditions of clearer sky. Water ice clouds are clearly detected around Ascreus Mons, with a strong asymmetry in latitude. Further comparison with the results of the thermal emission spectrometer (TES) on board of Mars global surveyor (MGS) is also provided, partially supporting our observations of air temperature fields. Possible explanation of these trends is represented by thermal circulation, driven by air heating close to the surface. If confirmed by future observations, these data can represent important constraint by PFS data to mesospheric simulation, with possible implications on the Global Circulation Models.

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