|
| | | | |
| | | |
| Stat |
Members: 3645
Articles: 2'504'928
Articles rated: 2609
25 April 2024 |
|
| | | | |
|
Article overview
| |
|
|
Heavy Positive Ion Groups in Titan's Ionosphere from Cassini Plasma Spectrometer IBS Observations | | Richard P. Haythornthwaite
; Andrew J. Coates
; Geraint H. Jones
; Anne Wellbrock
; J. Hunter Waite
; Veronique Vuitton
; Panayotis Lavvas
; | | Date: |
18 Sep 2020 | | Abstract: | Titan’s ionosphere contains a plethora of hydrocarbons and nitrile cations
and anions as measured by the Ion Neutral Mass Spectrometer and Cassini Plasma
Spectrometer (CAPS) onboard the Cassini spacecraft. Data from the CAPS Ion Beam
Spectrometer (IBS) sensor have been examined for five close encounters of Titan
during 2009. The high relative velocity of Cassini with respect to the cold
ions in Titan’s ionosphere allows CAPS IBS to function as a mass spectrometer.
Positive ion masses between 170 and 310 u/q are examined with ion mass groups
identified between 170 and 275 u/q containing between 14 and 21 heavy
(carbon/nitrogen/oxygen) atoms. These groups are the heaviest positive ion
groups reported so far from the available in situ ion data at Titan. The ion
group peaks are found to be consistent with masses associated with Polycyclic
Aromatic Compounds (PAC), including Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon (PAH) and
nitrogen-bearing polycyclic aromatic molecular ions. The ion group peak
identifications are compared with previously proposed neutral PAHs and are
found to be at similar masses, supporting a PAH interpretation. The spacing
between the ion group peaks is also investigated, finding a spacing of 12 or 13
u/q indicating the addition of C or CH. Lastly, the occurrence of several ion
groups is seen to vary across the five flybys studied, possibly relating to
diurnal variations in Titan’s ionosphere. These findings further the
understanding between the low mass ions and the high mass negative ions, as
well as with aerosol formation in Titan’s atmosphere. | | Source: | arXiv, 2009.08749 | | Services: | Forum | Review | PDF | Favorites | |
|
|
No review found.
Did you like this article?
Note: answers to reviews or questions about the article must be posted in the forum section.
Authors are not allowed to review their own article. They can use the forum section.
browser Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; ClaudeBot/1.0; +claudebot@anthropic.com)
|
| |
|
|
|
|
News, job offers and information for researchers and scientists:
| |
REGISTER