Journal
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
Volume 43, Issue 5, Pages 1862-1867Publisher
AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION
DOI: 10.1002/2016GL067707
Keywords
Mars; exosphere; MOM; MENCA; composition
Categories
Funding
- Indian Space Research Organization
Ask authors/readers for more resources
The Mars Exospheric Neutral Composition Analyser (MENCA) aboard the Indian Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) is a quadrupole mass spectrometer which provides in situ measurement of the composition of the low-latitude Martian neutral exosphere. The altitude profiles of the three major constituents, i.e., amu 44 (CO2), amu 28 (N-2 + CO), and amu 16 (O) in the Martian exosphere during evening (close to sunset terminator) hours are reported using MENCA observations from four orbits of MOM during late December 2014, when MOM's periapsis altitude was the lowest. The altitude range of the observation encompasses the diffusively separated region much above the well-mixed atmosphere. The transition from CO2 to O-dominated region is observed near 270km. The mean exospheric temperature derived using these three mass numbers is 2715K. These first observations corresponding to the Martian evening hours would help to provide constraints to the thermal escape models.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available