Spectroscopic Observations of the Lunar Surface From the MESSENGER Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS)

Computer Science – Performance

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

6235 Mercury, 6250 Moon (1221), 6297 Instruments And Techniques

Scientific paper

The MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft, currently en route to Mercury, flew by the Earth-Moon system with a closest approach on August 2, 2005. During the flyby, both the Ultraviolet-Visible Spectrometer (UVVS) channel and Visible-Near Infrared Spectrometer (VIRS) channel of the Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS) instrument acquired ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared spectra of the lunar surface at low to high southern latitudes. The sub- spacecraft point was near 60° S latitude and 80° W longitude. The sub-solar point during the observations was approximately 1.4° N and 117° W, giving a phase angle of approximately 65° for the duration of the observations. The MASCS fields of view were raster scanned over a box that was larger than the ~ 0.2° angular diameter of the Moon, with the majority of the surface observations on the far side. Due to the scanning motion of the spacecraft, the fields of view of both the UVVS and VIRS channels were skewed along the surface, producing a UVVS footprint size of ~ 670 km perpendicular to the spacecraft slew direction and from 670 to ~ 1400 km parallel to the spacecraft slew direction, depending on the spectral regime and spectral bandpass of the reduced data. The footprint of the VIRS channel was ~ 380 km perpendicular to the spacecraft slew direction and ~ 770 km parallel to the spacecraft slew direction. A subset of the surface data has been inter-compared among overlapping spectral channels in order to characterize instrument performance further as well as infer spectral properties of the rarely observed lunar far side. Part of the reduction process involves photometric normalization to account for variations in observational geometry with footprint locations. Spectral reflectance magnitude and color variations of far side regions observed by MASCS are compared with those of returned lunar highland and mare samples.

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Spectroscopic Observations of the Lunar Surface From the MESSENGER Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS) does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Spectroscopic Observations of the Lunar Surface From the MESSENGER Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS), we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Spectroscopic Observations of the Lunar Surface From the MESSENGER Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer (MASCS) will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1025127

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.