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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,…
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…
The evolution and escape of the martian atmosphere and the planet's water inventory can be separated into an early and late evolutionary epoch. The first epoch started from the planet's origin and lasted $\sim$500 Myr. Because of the high…
The origin of life on Earth seems to demand a highly reduced early atmosphere, rich in CH4, H2, and NH3, but geological evidence suggests that Earth's mantle has always been relatively oxidized and its emissions dominated by CO2 H2O, and…
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…
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,…
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…
Observations and simulations show that Mars' atmosphere has large seasonal variations. Total atmospheric density can have an order of magnitude latitudinal variation at exobase heights. By numerical simulations we show that these latitude…
The Mars Atmosphere-Ice Coupler MAIC-2 is a simple, latitudinal model, which consists of a set of parameterisations for the surface temperature, the atmospheric water transport and the surface mass balance (condensation minus evaporation)…
We present improved Mars Odyssey Neutron Spectrometer (MONS) maps of near-surface Water-Equivalent Hydrogen (WEH) on Mars that have intriguing implications for the global distribution of "excess" ice, which occurs when the mass fraction of…
Carbon dioxide is one of the major contributors to the radiative forcing, increasing both the temperature and the humidity of Earth's atmosphere. If the stellar irradiance increases and water becomes abundant in the stratosphere of an…
After Earth's origin, our host star, the Sun, was shining 20 to 25 percent less brightly than today. Without greenhouse-like conditions to warm the atmosphere, our early planet would have been an ice ball and life may never have evolved.…
The absence of global magnetic fields is often cited to explain why Mars lacks a dense atmosphere. This line of thought is based on a prevailing theory that magnetic fields can shield the atmosphere from solar wind erosion. However, we…
Photochemistry has the potential to substantially impact the atmospheric composition of exoplanets with consequences on the radiative transfer, thermal structure and dynamics of the atmospheres, particularly in UV-rich stellar environments.…
The Martian climate is governed by an annual cycle, that results in the condensation of CO$_{2}$ ice during winter, up to a meter thick at the pole and thousands of kilometers in extension. Water and dust may be trapped during the…
Sedimentary deposits characterized by the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover provide evidence that Gale crater, Mars intermittently hosted a fluvio-lacustrine environment during the Hesperian. However, estimates of the CO2 content of…
The Mars ambient space environment evolves with the varying solar activity. Understanding the Martian space environment, particularly the topside ionosphere across different phases of Solar Cycles (SC) 24 \& 25 remains a key research gap in…
Chemistry in Titan's N2-CH4 atmosphere produces complex organic aerosols. The chemical processes and the resulting organic compounds are still far from understood, although extensive observations, laboratory, and theoretical simulations…
The detection of sulphur species in the Martian atmosphere would be a strong indicator of volcanic outgassing from the surface of Mars. We wish to establish the presence of SO2, H2S, or OCS in the Martian atmosphere or determine upper…
Carbon dioxide (CO$_2$) ice clouds have been routinely observed in the middle atmosphere of Mars. However, there are still uncertainties concerning physical mechanisms that control their altitude, geographical, and seasonal distributions.…