Search

We report on results of an observational campaign to support the Juno mission. At thebeginning of 2016, using TEXES (Texas Echelon cross-dispersed Echelle Spectrograph),mounted on the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF), we obtained data cubes ofJupiter in the 1930–1943 cm−1 (5.14 - 5.18 μm) spectral range, which probes theatmosphere in the 1–4 bar region, with a spectral resolution of ≈ 0.15 cm −1 and anangular resolution of ≈ 1.4′′. This dataset is analyzed by a code which combines aline-by-line radiative transfer model with a non-linear optimal estimation inversionmethod. The inversion retrieves the vertical abundance profiles of NH3 — which is themain contributor at these wavelengths — with a maximum sensitivity at ≈ 1–3bar, as well as the cloud transmittance. This retrieval is performed on more thanone thousand pixels of our data cubes, producing maps of the disk, where all themajor belts are visible. We will discuss the results presented in our article, namelyour retrieved NH3 abundance maps which can be compared with the distributionobserved by Juno’s MWR (Bolton et al. 2017, Li et al. 2017) in the 2 bar regionand their significance for the understanding of Jupiter’s atmospheric dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]