Thermospheric nitric oxide from the ATLAS 1 and Spacelab 1 missions

Technical Report · Fri Sep 01 04:00:00 EDT 1995 · Journal of Geophysical Research

OSTI ID:200615

Torr, M R; Torr, D G; Chang, T; Richards, P; Swift, W; Li, N

Spectral and spatial images obtained with the Imaging Spectrometric Observatory on the ATLAS 1 and Spacelab 1 missions are used to study the ultraviolet emissions of nitric oxide in the thermosphere. By synthetically fitting the measured NO gamma bands, intensities are derived as a function of altitude and latitude. The authors find that the NO concentrations inferred from the ATLAS 1 measurements are higher than predicted by their thermospheric airglow model and tend to lie to the high side of a number of earlier measurements. By comparison with synthetic spectral fits, the shape of the NO gamma bands is used to derive temperature as a function of altitude. Using the simultaneous spectral and spatial imaging capability of the instrument, they present the first simultaneously acquired altitude images of NO gamma band temperature and intensity in the thermosphere. The lower thermospheric temperature images show structure as a function of altitude. The spatial imaging technique appears to be a viable means of obtaining temperatures in the middle and lower thermosphere, provided that good information is also obtained at the higher altitudes, as the contribution of the overlying, hotter NO is nonnegligible. By fitting both self-absorbed and nonabsorbed bands of the NO gamma system, they show that the self absorption effects are observable up to 200 km, although small above 150 km. The spectral resolution of the instrument (1.6 A) allows separation of the N(+)(S-5) doublet, and they show the contribution of this feature to the combination of the NO gamma (1,0) band and the N(+)(S-5) doublet as a function of altitude (less than 10% below 200 km). Spectral images including the NO delta bands support previous findings that the fluorescence efficiency is much higher than that determined from laboratory measurements. The Spacelab 1 data indicate the presence of a significant population of hot NO in the vehicle environment of that early shuttle mission.

• Research Organization: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Huntsville, AL (United States). George C. Marshall Space Flight Center
• OSTI ID: 200615
• Report Number(s): N--96-17838; NASA-CR--200032; NAS--1.26:200032; PAPER--98J01040; NIPS--96-07277; CNN: NAS8-37106; NAGW-3692
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
AIRGLOW
ALTITUDE
AMBIENT TEMPERATURE
EMISSION SPECTRA
NITRIC OXIDE
THERMOSPHERE