Early MAVEN Deep Dip campaign reveals thermosphere and ionosphere variability

Stephen Bougher (1) , Bruce Jakosky (2) , Jasper Halekas (3) , Joseph Grebowsky (4) , Janet Luhmann (5) , Paul Mahaffy (4) , Jack Connerney (4) , F. Eparvier (2) , Robert Ergun (2) , Davin Larson (5) , Jim Mcfadden (5) , David Mitchell (5) , Nick Schneider (2) , Richard Zurek (6) , Christian Mazelle (7) , Laila Andersson (2) , David Andrews (8) , Darren Baird (9) , Daniel N. Baker (2) , Jared M. Bell (10) , Mehdi Benna (4) , David Brain (2) , Michael Chaffin (2) , Phillip Chamberlin (4) , Jean-Yves Chaufray (11) , John Clarke (12) , Glyn Collinson (4) , Mike Combi (1) , Frank Crary (2) , Thomas Cravens (13) , Matteo Crismani (2) , Shannon Curry (5) , David Curtis (5) , Justin Deighan (2) , Greg Delory (5) , Ryan Dewey (2) , Gina Dibraccio (4) , Chuanfei Dong (1) , Yaxue Dong (2) , P. Dunn (5) , M. Elrod (4) , S. England (5) , Anders Eriksson (8) , Jared Espley (4) , S. Evans (14) , Xiaohua Fang (2) , Matthew Fillingim (5) , Kier Fortier (2) , Chris M. Fowler (2) , Allan J. Fox (15) , Hannes Gröller (16) , S. Guzewich (4) , T. Hara (5) , Y. Harada (5) , G. Holsclaw (2) , S. K. Jain (2) , R. Jolitz (5) , François Leblanc (11) , Christina O. Lee (5) , Y. Lee (1) , Franck Lefèvre (17) , Robert Lillis (5) , R. Livi (5) , D. Lo (16) , Yingjuan Ma (18) , M. Mayyasi (12) , William Mcclintock (2) , T. Mcenulty (2) , Ronan Modolo (11) , Franck Montmessin (17) , M. Morooka (2) , Andrew Nagy (1) , K. Olsen (1) , W. Peterson (2) , A. Rahmati (13) , S. Ruhunusiri (3) , C. T. Russell (18) , S. Sakai (13) , Jean-André Sauvaud (7) , Kanako Seki (19) , Morgan Steckiewicz (7) , M. Stevens (20) , A. I. F. Stewart (2) , Arnaud Stiepen (2) , S. Stone (16) , V. Tenishev (1) , E. Thiemann (2) , R. Tolson (10) , Dominique Toublanc (7) , M. Vogt (12) , T. Weber (2) , P. Withers (12) , T. Woods (2) , Roger Yelle (16)

1 CLaSP - Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering
2 LASP - Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics [Boulder]
3 Department of Physics and Astronomy [Ames, Iowa]
4 GSFC - NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
5 SSL - Space Sciences Laboratory [Berkeley]
6 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
7 IRAP - Institut de recherche en astrophysique et planétologie
8 IRF - Swedish Institute of Space Physics [Uppsala]
9 JSC - NASA Johnson Space Center
10 NIA - National Institute of Aerospace [Hampton]
11 HELIOS - LATMOS
12 Department of Astronomy [Boston]
13 Department of Physics and Astronomy [Lawrence Kansas]
14 Computational Physics, Inc.
15 Department of Physics [Dayton]
16 LPL - Lunar and Planetary Laboratory [Tucson]
17 PLANETO - LATMOS
18 IGPP - Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics [Los Angeles]
19 STEL - Solar-Terrestrial Environment Laboratory [Nagoya]
20 NRL - Naval Research Laboratory

The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission, during the second of its Deep Dip campaigns, made comprehensive measurements of martian thermosphere and ionosphere composition, structure, and variability at altitudes down to ~130 kilometers in the subsolar region. This altitude range contains the diffusively separated upper atmosphere just above the well-mixed atmosphere, the layer of peak extreme ultraviolet heating and primary reservoir for atmospheric escape. In situ measurements of the upper atmosphere reveal previously unmeasured populations of neutral and charged particles, the homopause altitude at approximately 130 kilometers, and an unexpected level of variability both on an orbit-to-orbit basis and within individual orbits. These observations help constrain volatile escape processes controlled by thermosphere and ionosphere structure and variability.

Domains: Ocean, Atmosphere; Earth and Planetary Astrophysics [astro-ph.EP]; Solar and Stellar Astrophysics [astro-ph.SR]

Stephen Bougher, Bruce Jakosky, Jasper Halekas, Joseph Grebowsky, Janet Luhmann, et al.. Early MAVEN Deep Dip campaign reveals thermosphere and ionosphere variability. Science, 2015, 350 (6261), pp.aad0459. ⟨10.1126/science.aad0459⟩. ⟨insu-01227156⟩