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Continuous observations of the inner Solar System: Mapping Venus winds

Continuous observations of the inner Solar System: Mapping Venus winds. Mark A. Bullock Eliot F. Young Southwest Research Institute. Venus nightside at 2.3 m m. The Atmosphere. Winds and General Circulation. Near-IR emission spectrum of Venus. May 4, 2004. Venus 2.3 m m. May 5, 2004.

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Continuous observations of the inner Solar System: Mapping Venus winds

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  1. Continuous observations of the inner Solar System: Mapping Venus winds Mark A. Bullock Eliot F. Young Southwest Research Institute Venus nightside at 2.3 mm LCANS SwRI Boulder

  2. The Atmosphere LCANS SwRI Boulder

  3. Winds and General Circulation LCANS SwRI Boulder

  4. Near-IR emission spectrum of Venus LCANS SwRI Boulder

  5. May 4, 2004 Venus 2.3 mm May 5, 2004 IRTF May 6, 2004 LCANS SwRI Boulder May 8, 2004 Eliot Young May 9, 2004 Mark Bullock

  6. Moving through an image cube • 60” spectrometer slit allowed to drift over Venus disk. • Acquired ‘jail bar’ spectra ~50 in 15 minutes. • Reassembled into image cubes, 0.8 to 2.5 mm. LCANS SwRI Boulder

  7. Venus Express VIRTIS images 1.7 mm emission images Upper left: South pole at lower right, 60o S upper left. Upper right: Bottom left of image over Alpha Regio Lower left: Near south pole Lower right: Near equator in the southern hemisphere LCANS SwRI Boulder

  8. Venus Observation Geometry LCANS SwRI Boulder

  9. Size of Venus at focal plane 5 weeks before inferior conjunction. 40” disk 26% illuminated 110 diffraction-limited elements across disk Inferior conjunction. 60” disk full nightside 160 diffraction-limited elements across disk LCANS SwRI Boulder

  10. Payload Specifications • Telescope Aperture: 1 meter • Plate Scale: 0.125 arcsec • Field of View: 64 arcsec • Diffraction limit: 0.6 arcsec at 2.5 mm 0.2 arcsec at 0.8 mm • Simultaneous imaging and spectra 0.8-2.5 mm • Spectral Resolution l/dl = 4000 • Pointing accuracy/stability: ±0.3 arcsec • Minimum Sun angle: 10o • Temperatures • Structure at -40oC • LN2 for IR detector array LCANS SwRI Boulder

  11. Conclusions • Continuous near-IR observations of Venus cloud motion necessary to understand the general circulation. • Synoptic view is highly complementary with VEX VIRTIS and VMC. • Continuous cloud tracking with balloon-borne 1 m imager and spectrometer for 10 weeks will allow simultaneous atmospheric motion maps and below-cloud CO, H2O, OCS maps. • These observations are key to understanding Venus’ atmospheric superotation. LCANS SwRI Boulder

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