Venus' thermospheric temperature field using a refraction model at terminator : comparison with 2012 transit observations using SDO/HMI, VEx/SPICAV/SOIR and NSO/DST/FIRS
Abstract
The transit of Venus in June 2012 provided a unique case study of the Venus' atmosphere transiting in front of the Sun, while at the same time ESA's Venus Express orbiter observed the evening terminator at solar ingress and solar egress.We report on mesospheric temperature at Venus' morning terminator using SDO/HMI aureole photometry and comparison with Venus Express. Close to ingress and egress phases, we have shown that the aureole photometry reflects the local density scale height and the altitude of the refracting layer (Tanga et al. 2012). The lightcurve of each spatially resolved aureole element is fit to a two-parameter model to constrain the meridional temperature gradient at terminator. Our measurements are in agreement with the VEx/SOIR temperatures obtained during orbit 2238 at evening terminator during solar ingress (46.75N - LST = 6.075PM) and solar egress (31.30N - LST = 6.047PM) captured from the Venus Express orbiter at the time Venus transited the Sun.We also performed spectroscopy and polarimetry during the transit of Venus focusing on extracting signatures of CO2 absorption. Observations were taken during the first half of the transit using the Facility InfraRed Spectropolarimeter (FIRS) on the Dunn Solar Telescope (DST). Although the predicted CO2 transmission spectrum of Venus was not particularly strong at 1565 nm, this region of the H-band often used in magnetic field studies of the Sun's photosphere provides a particularly flat solar continuum with few atmospheric lines. Sun-subtracted Venus limb observations show intensity distribution of vibrational CO2 bands 221 2v+2v2+v3 at 1.571μm and 141 v1+4v2+v3 at 1.606μm.
- Publication:
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AAS/Division for Planetary Sciences Meeting Abstracts #46
- Pub Date:
- November 2014
- Bibcode:
- 2014DPS....4630206W