Influence of Mercury's laterally varying surface temperature on its mantle convection, geoid, lithospheric stress distribution and dynamo action

Details Influence of Mercury's laterally varying surface temperature on its mantle convection, geoid, lithospheric stress distribution and dynamo action Influence of Mercury's laterally varying surface temperature on its mantle convection, geoid, lithospheric stress distribution and dynamo action

Sep 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008epsc.conf..106t&link_type=abstract

European Planetary Science Congress 2008, Proceedings of the conference held 21-25 September, 2008 in Münster, Germany. Online a

Physics

Scientific paper

Abstract Due to the absence of an atmosphere and proximity to the Sun, Mercury's surface temperature varies laterally by several 100s K, even when averaged over long time periods. The dominant variation in timeaveraged surface T occurs from pole to equator (~225 K) [1]. The resonant relationship between Mercury's orbit and rotation results in a smaller longitudinal variation (~100 K) [1]. Here we demonstrate, using models of mantle convection in a 3-D spherical shell, that this stationary lateral variation in surface temperature has a small but significant influence on mantle convection and on the lateral variation of heat flux across the core-mantle boundary (CMB). We evaluate the possible observational signature of this laterally-varying convection in terms of boundary topography, stress distribution, gravity and moment of inertia tensor. We furthermore test whether the lateral variation in CMB flux is capable of driving a thermal wind dynamo, i.e., weak dynamo action with no internally-driven core convective motions.

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