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The zonal wind profile of Saturn has a unique structure at 60°N with a double-peaked jet that reaches maximum zonal velocities close to 100 ms−1. In this region, a singular group of vortices consisting of a cyclone surrounded by two anticyclones was active since 2012 until the time of this report. Our observation demonstrates that vortices in Saturn can be long-lived. The three-vortex system drifts...
Since 2013, observations of Neptune with small telescopes (28–50 cm) have resulted in several detections of long-lived bright atmospheric features that have also been observed by large telescopes such as Keck II or Hubble. The combination of both types of images allows the study of the long-term evolution of major cloud systems in the planet. In 2013 and 2014 two bright features were present on the...
Shallow water simulations are used to present a unified study of three major storms on Saturn (nicknamed as Great White Spots, GWS) at different latitudes, polar (1960), equatorial (1990), and mid-latitude (2010) (Sánchez-Lavega, 2004; Sánchez-Lavega et al., 2011). In our model, the three GWS are initiated by introducing a Gaussian function pulse at the latitude of the observed phenomena with controlled...
The Venus thermal radiation spectrum exhibits the signature of CO 2 absorption bands. By means of inversion techniques, those bands enable the retrieval of atmospheric temperature profiles. We have analyzed VIRTIS-M-IR night-side data obtaining high-resolution thermal maps of the Venus south polar region between 55 and 85km altitudes. This analysis is specific to three Venus Express orbits...
High resolution images of Venus Northern hemisphere obtained with the Venus Monitoring Camera (VMC/VEx) allow studying small-scale dynamical phenomena at the cloud tops (∼62–70km altitude) including features like wave trains. A systematic visual search of these waves was performed; more than 1500 orbits were analyzed and wave patterns were observed in more than 300 images. Four types of waves were...
We study the effects of migrating solar tides on the winds at the cloud tops of the polar region of Venus. The winds were measured using cloud tracking on images obtained at wavelengths of 3.9 and 5.0μm by the instrument VIRTIS-M onboard Venus Express. These wavelengths probe about the same altitude close to the cloud tops, allowing for the first time to retrieve winds simultaneously in the day and...
The northern mid-latitudes of Uranus produce greater episodes of bright cloud formation than any other region on the planet. Near 30°N, very bright cloud features were observed in 1999, 2004, and 2005, with lifetimes of the order of months. In October 2011, Gemini and HST observations revealed another unusually bright cloud feature near 23°N, which was subsequently identified in July 2011 observations...
We present a study of the vertical cloud structure for the initial stage of the Great White Spot (GWS), a giant storm that developed in Saturn in December 2010, using ground-based visual images. We focus in the characterization of the undisturbed atmosphere preceding the storm and the disturbed region in the wake of the GWS. The observations were taken at Calar Alto (Spain) and Pic du Midi (France)...
The Venus Express (VEX) mission has been in orbit to Venus for more than 4 years now. The Visible and Infrared Thermal Imaging Spectrometer (VIRTIS) instrument onboard VEX observes Venus in two channels (visible and infrared) obtaining spectra and multi-wavelength images of the planet that can be used to sample the atmosphere at different altitudes. Day-side images in the ultraviolet range (380nm)...
The South Equatorial Belt (SEB) of Jupiter is known to alternate its appearance at visible wavelengths from a classical belt-like band most of the time to a short-lived zone-like aspect which is called a “fade” of the belt, hereafter SEBF. The albedo change of the SEB is due to a change in the structure and properties of the clouds and upper hazes. Recent works based on infrared observations of the...
Five years of Cassini Imaging Science Subsystem images, from 2004 to 2009, are analyzed in this work to retrieve global zonal wind profiles of Saturn’s northern and southern hemispheres in the methane absorbing bands at 890 and 727nm and in their respective adjacent continuum wavelengths of 939 and 752nm. A complete view of Saturn’s global circulation, including the equator, at two pressure levels,...
We present a study of the long-term evolution of the cloud of aerosols produced in the atmosphere of Jupiter by the impact of an object on 19 July 2009 (Sánchez-Lavega, A. et al. [2010]. Astrophys. J. 715, L155–L159). The work is based on images obtained during 5months from the impact to 31 December 2009 taken in visible continuum wavelengths and from 20 July 2009 to 28 May 2010 taken in near-infrared...
We present a study of the equatorial region of Jupiter, between latitudes ∼15°S and ∼15°N, based on Cassini ISS images obtained during the Jupiter flyby at the end of 2000, and HST images acquired in May and July 2008. We examine the structure of the zonal wind profile and report the detection of significant longitudinal variations in the intensity of the 6°N eastward jet, up to 60ms −1 in...
The atmospheres of the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn possess large numbers of vortices (closed circulation ovals). On the larger scale, above 2000km, anticyclones on Jupiter and Saturn are generally long-lived coherent structures while cyclones survive a much shorter time and behave more chaotically. A long term survey of images of Saturn’s atmosphere obtained by the Cassini ISS camera has revealed...
A study of the dynamics of the second largest anticyclone in Jupiter, Oval BA, and its red colour change that occurred in late 2005 is presented in a three part study. The first part, this paper, deals with its long-term kinematical and dynamical behaviour monitored since its formation in 2000 to September 2008 using ground-based observations archived at the public International Outer Planet Watch...
A study of the vertical cloud structure of oval BA and its red color change is presented in this third part of our complete analysis. A large interest in Jupiter’s anticyclone BA was created by its reddening that occurred between 2005 and 2006. In this work we quantify the color change in oval BA by using images taken with the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) onboard the Hubble Space Telescope (HST)...
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