Physics
Scientific paper
Dec 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009agufm.p42a..02w&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2009, abstract #P42A-02
Physics
[5759] Planetary Sciences: Fluid Planets / Rings And Dust, [6200] Planetary Sciences: Solar System Objects, [6265] Planetary Sciences: Solar System Objects / Planetary Rings, [6280] Planetary Sciences: Solar System Objects / Saturnian Satellites
Scientific paper
The Cassini radio and plasma wave science (RPWS) instrument is sensitive to micron-sized dust grains impacting on the spacecraft. Through the year of 2008, Cassini completed four very close flybys of Enceladus. They are the E3, E4, E5, and E6 flybys. All flybys were targeted to fly the spacecraft through the water plume near the south pole of Enceladus. At closest approach, the spacecraft was merely several tens of kilometers away from the moon's surface. The RPWS instrumentation thus had good opportunities to measure the dust grains in the water plume. Waveform measurements from dipole antenna (u and v) provide a nice way by which to count impacts, leading to the fluxes and, hence, the number density of the grains given a mass threshold. Peak impact rates of about 600-800 s-1 are found for all 4 flybys as the spacecraft approached to the center of the water plume. The corresponding dust densities are of order 7.2 x 10-2m-3 to 9.6 x 10-2m-3. The variation of dust fluxes as a function of time is well described by a Gaussian distribution with a corresponding scale thickness of about 1600 km. The mass distribution for all 4 flybys varies from m-1.34 to m-1.89. The spectrum measurement from the monopole antenna (w antenna) can provide a determination of root-mean-square particle mass. As recently reported, CAPS instrument detected nanograins in the water plume. We plan to compare our mass distribution with CAPS dust measurements.
Averkamp T. F.
Gurnett Donald A.
Kurth Willaim S.
Wang Ziqiang
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