P050-11
Balloon-based Atmospheric Investigations of Venus

Friday, 11 December 2020: 06:00
Virtual
Kevin H Baines, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, United States, James A Cutts, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Californian Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, United States, Sushil K Atreya, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, United States, Mark Bullock, Southwest Research Institute Boulder, Boulder, United States, Kandis Lea Jessup, Southwest Research Inst, Boulder, CO, United States, Sebastien Lebonnois, CNRS, Paris Cedex 16, France, Dragan Nikolic, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Annandale, VA, United States, Jean-Baptiste Renard, Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace, Orléans Cedex 2, France, Olivier Mousis, Aix Marseille Université, CNRS, LAM (Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille), Marseille, France, Sara Seager, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, EAPS, Physics, Aeroastro, Cambridge, MA, United States and Colin F Wilson, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
Abstract:
The VEXAG Roadmap1 supplemented by two community workshops on the science return, complexities, and risks of aerial platforms2 has validated the use of a long-lived, altitude-varying balloon-borne instrumented "aerobot" for the detailed exploration of Venus's atmosphere. Utilizing the large (~80 m s-1) zonal winds predominate at < 60o latitude, the aerobot mission concept would circle the planet more than a dozen times over a notional 90-Earth-day science phase as it likely wanders poleward from its deployment near 10o lat, with an excellent chance of visiting high latitudes >50o. Onboard instrumentation would sample the environment over all times of day including (1) its winds in all three dimensions, (2) the pressure/temperature structure, and (3) the composition of the air and aerosols3, including (A) UV-absorbing materials which possibly are linked to astrobiology, (B) the reactive sulfur-cycle gases creating the aerosols, and (C) the noble gases, their isotopes and the isotopes of light gases - key to understanding the formation and evolution of the planet and its atmosphere4. The aerobot, capable of multiple 10-km-altitude traverses centered near 55-km (~0.5 bar, 25C), would enable 3-dimensional maps of these environmental characteristics as well as the dynamically/chemically influenced size distribution of aerosol particles via a nephelometer/particle-counter5 . These traverses also reveal the vertically-varying characteristics of atmospheric stability, gravity and planetary waves and Hadley cells, important for understanding the mechanisms that power and sustain the planet's strong super-rotation. Such altitude excursions also enable measurements of radiative balance and solar energy deposition via a Net Flux Radiometer6, another key to understanding super-rotation.

1VEXAG, 2014. https://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/reports/Roadmap-140617.pdf

2Cutts, J. A., et al. 2018. Aerial platforms for the scientific exploration of Venus JPL D-102569.

3Baines, K. H. et al. 2018. LPI Contrib. #2137. https://www.hou.usra.edu /meetings/vexag2018/pdf/8031.pdf

4Baines, K. H., et al., 2013. In Comparative Climatology of Terrestrial Planets (U. of Ariz. Press, Pp. 137-160.

5Renard, J-B. et al. 2016. Atmos. Meas. Tech., 9, 1721–1742.

6Aslam, S., et al. EPSC Abstracts, Vol 10. EPSC2015-388.

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