The Noble Gas Abundances in the Coma of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko from Rosetta/ROSINA

Martin Rubin (1) , Kathrin Altwegg (1) , Hans R. Balsiger (1) , Jean-Jacques Berthelier (2) , Christelle Briois (3) , Michael R. Combi (4) , Johan de Keyser (5) , Björn Fiethe (6) , Stephen A. Fuselier (7) , Sébastien Gasc (1) , Tamas I. Gombosi (8) , Kenneth C. Hansen (9) , Annette Jäckel (1) , Ernest Kopp (1) , Axel Korth (10) , Urs Mall (10) , Bernard Marty (11) , Olivier Mousis (12) , Tobias Owen (13) , Henri Rème (5) , Markus Schuhmann (1) , Isaac R. H. G. Schroeder (1) , Thierry Sémon (1) , Chia-Yu Tzou (1) , Jack H . Waite Jr (14) , Peter Wurz (1)

1 Physikalisches Institut [Bern]
2 HELIOS - LATMOS
3 LPC2E - Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace
4 University of Michigan [Ann Arbor]
5 BIRA-IASB - Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy / Institut d'Aéronomie Spatiale de Belgique
6 IDA - Institute of Computer and Network Engineering [Braunschweig]
7 SwRI - Southwest Research Institute [San Antonio]
8 CLaSP - Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering
9 AOSS - Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Space Sciences [Ann Arbor]
10 MPS - Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research
11 CRPG - Centre de Recherches Pétrographiques et Géochimiques
12 LAM - Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille
13 Institute for Astronomy [Honolulu]
14 Space Science and Engineering Division [San Antonio]

The Rosetta Orbiter Spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analysis (ROSINA), the mass spectrometer suite on board the European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission, was dedicated to the measurement of the volatiles in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P) [1]. Among many other species, ROSINA DFMS, the Double Focusing Mass Spectrometer, detected and quantified the three noble gases argon, krypton, and xenon including their major isotopes [2,3]. Noble gases provide important clues to the physical and chemical conditions during and possibly even before and after the comet’s formation in the early solar system. Furthermore, measurements of the isotope ratios provide constraints on the amount of cometary material brought to Earth and its early atmosphere. In this presentation, we will report on the measured coma densities and derived nucleus bulk abundances of these three noble gases and investigate correlations with other volatiles. Furthermore, we will discuss the measured isotope ratios and the implications of these results.

Domains: Sciences of the Universe [physics]

Martin Rubin, Kathrin Altwegg, Hans R. Balsiger, Jean-Jacques Berthelier, Christelle Briois, et al.. The Noble Gas Abundances in the Coma of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko from Rosetta/ROSINA. AGU 2017 Fall Meeting, Dec 2017, New Orleans, United States. ⟨insu-01676642⟩