H Escape in 3D: MAVEN IUVS observations of the Mars corona
Résumé
Mars has lost a significant fraction of its initial water inventory to space, as evidenced by surface morphology and an enrichment of the heavy isotope deuterium relative to hydrogen. This loss continues today via thermal Jeans escape of neutral hydrogen from the extended H corona. The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN mission's Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrometer IUVS constrains this escape with high cadence, spatially resolved measurements of the corona in scattered sunlight in the Lyman alpha line of neutral H at 121.6 nm. These measurements indicate spatial variability in the corona never before recognized, with potential effects on reconstructing the escape history of water and on retrieved escape rates from previous spatially unresolved observations. I will present our current progress in retrieving escape rates and density distributions from the IUVS observations, including the degree to which observations of the H corona can constrain the thermospheric general circulation at Mars.