Related papers: Eight-year Climatology of Dust Optical Depth on Ma…
This paper refines model predictions for the production of methane from UV-irradiated interplanetary dust particles (IDPs) now that the Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) instrument onboard the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Rover…
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) spacecraft has been in orbit around Mars since March 2006. The Context Camera (CTX) on MRO has returned over 100,000 images of the planet at approximately 5-6 meters per pixel, providing nearly global…
Early Mars climate research has well-defined goals (Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group 2018). Achieving these goals requires geologists and climate modelers to coordinate. Coordination is easier if results are expressed in terms of…
We present a concept for using a polarization sensitive multispectral lidar to map the seasonal distribution and exchange of volatiles among the reservoirs of the Martian surface and atmosphere. The LIDAR instrument will be a…
The Los Alamos National Laboratory designed and built Mars Odyssey Neutron Spectrometer (MONS) has been in excellent health operating from February 2002 to the present. MONS measures the neutron leakage albedo from galactic cosmic ray…
The spectral signature of water ice was observed on Martian south polar cap in 2004 by the Observatoire pour l'Mineralogie, l'Eau les Glaces et l'Activite (OMEGA) (Bibring et al., 2004). Three years later, the OMEGA instrument was used to…
Global and mesoscale models represent the background (slowly varying) winds on Mars, but short timescale wind variability is not explicitly represented. The local wind erosion and dust deposition model can be useful for more accurate local…
The Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD), on board Mars Science Laboratory's (MSL) Curiosity rover, has been measuring ground level particle fluxes along with the radiation dose rate at the surface of Mars since August 2012. Similar to…
One of the frontier research fields of exoplanetary science is the study of the composition and variability of exoplanetary atmospheres. This field is now moving from the gas giant planets towards the smaller and colder telluric planets,…
A comprehensive study of Nitric oxide (NO) chemistry in the Martian upper atmosphere is restricted due to the lack of requisite measurements. NO is an abundant form of odd nitrogen species in the Martian lower atmosphere and its density…
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…
We report on mapping of the north polar region of Mars using data from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) instrument. We have observed three Mars Years (28-30) of late-winter and spring recessions…
A model for the formation and distribution of sedimentary rocks on Mars is proposed. The rate-limiting step is supply of liquid water from seasonal melting of snow or ice. The model is run for a O(10^2) mbar pure CO2 atmosphere, dusty snow,…
Small-crater counts on Mars light-toned sedimentary rock are often inconsistent with any isochron; these data are usually plotted then ignored. We show (using an 18-HiRISE-image, >10^4 crater dataset) that these non-isochron crater counts…
Space weather observations and modeling at Mars have begun but they must be significantly increased to support the future of Human Exploration on the Red Planet. A comprehensive space weather understanding of a planet without a global…
Planet-encircling dust storms fundamentally reshape Martian weather and the near-surface electrostatic environment. We investigate the generation and evolution of electric fields during global dust storms using bimodal dust size…
Characterizing the Martian atmosphere is an essential objective to understand its meteorology and its climate. The lower atmosphere (< 40 km) and middle atmosphere (40-80 km) of Mars appear dynamically coupled at much higher levels than in…
Understanding the diurnal behavior of lee wave clouds on Mars provides critical insight into the planet's mesoscale atmospheric dynamics and their interaction with surface topography. Lee wave clouds exhibit distinct spatial and temporal…
A diagnosis of the Ar densities measured by the Neutral Gas and Ion Mass Spectrometer aboard the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) and the temperatures derived from these densities shows that solar activity, solar insolation,…
Coagulation of particles occurs when two particles collide and stick together. In the Martian atmosphere, dust coagulation would increase the effective particle size, as small particles accrete to larger particles. Murphy et al. (1990)…