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Besides oxygen-bearing neutral gas and ions, the Saturnian rings could be a source of small dust particles of nano-meter size range. Electrostatic charging effect by photoemission and/or electron impact could lead to ejection of the nano-grains out of the ring plane by electromagnetic force. The orbital motion of low-velocity charged dust generated by mutual collision of the ring particles has been...
Using the US Air Force’s Starfire Optical Range 3.5 meter telescope with adaptive optics and a laser guidestar, we obtained 68 images of asteroid (87) Sylvia and its satellite Romulus over 6 nights in March and May of 2015. Adding an additional 3 images from earlier observations on one night in November 2012, we are able to derive a circular (but not an eccentric) orbit for Romulus, leading to a density...
We present a novel model showing that compound chondrules are formed by collisions of supercooled droplets. This model reproduces two prominent observed features of compound chondrules: the nonporphyritic texture and the size ratio between two components.
The upcoming Juno and Cassini gravity measurements of Jupiter and Saturn, respectively, will allow probing the internal dynamics of these planets through accurate analysis of their gravity spectra. To date, two general approaches have been suggested for relating the flow velocities and gravity fields. In the first, barotropic potential surface models, which naturally take into account the oblateness...
We present and analyze three-dimensional data cubes of Neptune from the OSIRIS integral-field spectrograph on the 10-m W.M. Keck II telescope, from 26 July 2009. These data have a spatial resolution of 0.035/pixel and spectral resolution of R ∼3800 in the H (1.47–1.80 µm) and K (1.97–2.38 µm) broad bands. We focus our analysis on regions of Neptune’s atmosphere that are near-infrared dark – that is,...
The Nili Fossae region of Mars contains some of the most mineralogically diverse bedrock on the planet. Previous studies have established three main stratigraphic units in the region: a phyllosilicate-bearing basement rock, a variably altered olivine-rich basalt, and a capping rock. Here, we present evidence for the localized alteration of the northeast Nili Fossae capping unit, previously considered...
The energetics of the atmosphere of the northern hemisphere of Mars during the pre-winter solstice period are explored using the Mars Analysis Correction Data Assimilation (MACDA) dataset (v1.0) and the eddy kinetic energy equation, with the quasi-geostrophic omega equation providing vertical velocities. Traveling waves are typically triggered by geopotential flux convergence. The effect of dust on...
Saturn’s Great Storm of 2010–2011 produced a planet-encircling wake that slowly transitioned from a region that was mainly dark at 5 µm in February 2011 to a region that was almost entirely bright and remarkably uniform by December of 2012. The uniformity and high emission levels suggested that the entire wake region had been cleared not only of the ammonia clouds that the storm had generated and...
Water ice near the surface of main belt asteroids is gradually lost to space. A mantle of low thermal conductivity causes large surface temperature amplitudes, and thus increased cooling by thermal re-radiation, lowering temperatures well below the fast-rotator limit. A computational barrier for modeling this ice loss is the multi-scale character of the problem: accurate temperatures require many...
We revisit the constraints on the deep lunar interior with a possible low-viscosity zone at the core-mantle boundary obtained from our previous forward modeling of the tidal response of the Moon, by comparing a numerical model with several tidal parameters (i.e., k2, k3, h2, and Q) that have been improved or are newly determined by recent geodetic observations and analyses from GRAIL (gravity), LRO...
An analysis of the surface and interior state of Asteroid (101955) Bennu, the target asteroid of the OSIRIS-REx sample return mission, is given using models based on Earth-based observations of this body. These observations have enabled models of its shape, spin state, mass and surface properties to be developed. Based on these data the range of surface and interior states possible for this body are...
Disequilibrium species have been used previously to probe the deep water abundances and the eddy diffusion coefficient for giant planets. In this paper, we present a diffusion-kinetics code that predicts the abundances of disequilibrium species in the tropospheres of Jupiter and Saturn with updated thermodynamic and kinetic data. The dependence on the deep water abundance and the eddy diffusion coefficient...
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