Related papers: Mars surface phase function constrained by orbital…
Condensation and sublimation of ices at the surface of the planet is a key part of both the Martian H$_2$O and CO$_2$ cycles, either from a seasonal or diurnal aspect. While most of the ice is located within the polar caps, surface frost is…
Characterizing the exchange of water between the Martian atmosphere and the (sub)surface is a major challenge for understanding the mechanisms that regulate the water cycle. Here we present a new dataset of water ice detected on the Martian…
Mars' thin, CO$_2$-rich atmosphere poses a unique puzzle involving composition, climate history, and habitability. This work explores the intrincate relationship between Mars' atmospheric variations and dynamic solar activity patterns. We…
It is the most appropriate time to characterize the Earth-like exoplanets in order to detect biosignature beyond the Earth because such exoplanets will be the prime targets of big-budget missions like JWST, Roman Space Telescope, HabEx,…
Robust atmospheric and radiative transfer modeling will be required to properly interpret reflected light and thermal emission spectra of terrestrial exoplanets. This will help break observational degeneracies between the numerous…
We derive efficient, closed form, differentiable, and numerically stable solutions for the flux measured from a spherical planet or moon seen in reflected light, either in or out of occultation. Our expressions apply to the computation of…
Recent papers by Ansari et al. (2024, Science Advances 10, eadn4650) and Richardson et al. (2025, arXiv eprint 2504.01455) have suggested that global warming of the Martian surface ('terraforming') by 35 K to sustain local habitats above…
Mars' polar layered deposits (PLD) are comprised of layers of varying dust-to-water ice volume mixing ratios (VMR) that may record astronomically-forced climatic variation over Mars' recent orbital history. Retracing the formation of these…
Over the course of 3.1 years we determined the position of Mars on 75 dates using a handheld cross staff and two to five bright reference stars of known right ascension and declination on each occasion. On average the observed positions of…
One of the main objectives of the Mars Exploration Program is to search for evidence of past or current life on the planet. To achieve this, Mars exploration has been focusing on regions that may have liquid or frozen water. A set of…
Seasonal frosting and defrosting on the surface of Mars is hypothesized to drive both climate processes and the formation and evolution of geomorphological features such as gullies. Past studies have focused on manually analyzing the…
We compare estimates of atmospheric precipitation during the Martian Noachian-Hesperian boundary 3.8 Gyr ago as calculated in a radiative-convective column model of the atmosphere with runoff values estimated from a geomorphological…
In this paper we propose an analytic function for the spherical albedo values of airless and near-airless magma ocean planets (AMOPs). We generated 2-D fractal surfaces with varying compositions onto which we individually threw 10,000 light…
A Martian semiannual oscillation (SAO), similar to that in the Earth's tropical stratosphere, is evident in the Mars Analysis Correction Data Assimilation reanalysis dataset (MACDA) version 1.0, not only in the tropics, but also extending…
Modeling the brightness of satellites in large Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations can not only assist the astronomical community in assessing the impact of reflected light from satellites, optimizing observing schedules and guiding data…
Direct imaging of widely separated exoplanets from space will obtain their reflected light spectra and measure atmospheric properties. Previous calculations have shown that a change in the orbital phase would cause a spectral signal, but…
For the first time, the Emirates Mars Infrared Spectrometer (EMIRS) instrument on board the Emirates Mars Mission (EMM) "Hope", is providing us with the temperature measurements of Mars at all local times covering most of the planet. As a…
Transit spectroscopy is a powerful tool for probing atmospheric structures of exoplanets. Accurately accounting for the effects of aerosols is key to reconstructing atmospheric properties from transit spectra, yet this remains a significant…
For terrestrial exoplanets with thin atmospheres or no atmospheres, the surface contributes light to the reflected light signal of the planet. Measurement of the variety of disk-integrated brightnesses of bodies in the Solar System and the…
This paper is the first paper of a series that will present the derivation of the modal mineralogy of Mars (M3 project) at a global scale from the near-infrared dataset acquired by the imaging spectrometer OMEGA (Observatoire pour la…