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Microwave remote sensing of Jupiter's atmosphere from an orbiting spacecraft

Authors :
Andrew P. Ingersoll
Scott Bolton
Samuel Gulkis
L. W. Kamp
Steven Levin
Michael A. Janssen
Mark Hofstadter
Michael Allison
Source :
Icarus. 173:447-453
Publication Year :
2005
Publisher :
Elsevier BV, 2005.

Abstract

Microwave remote sounding from a spacecraft flying by or in orbit around Jupiter offers new possibilities for retrieving important and presently poorly understood properties of its atmosphere. In particular, we show that precise measurements of relative brightness temperature as a function of off-nadir emission angles, combined with absolute brightness temperature measurements, can allow us to determine the global abundances of water and ammonia and study the dynamics and deep circulations of the atmosphere in the altitude range from the ammonia cloud region to depths greater than 30 bars in a manner which would not be achievable with ground-based telescopes.

Details

ISSN :
00191035
Volume :
173
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Icarus
Accession number :
edsair.doi...........82da3233c80ba3dd145d22fd62051c6a