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[18.03] A reanalysis of the 1971 Beta Scorpii occultation data : study of the temperature fluctuations and search for wave activity

E. Raynaud, P. Drossart, K. Matcheva, F. Roques, B. Sicardy (LESIA, Observatoire de Paris-Meudon, France)

The Beta Scorpii occultation by the southern hemisphere of Jupiter on May 13^th, 1971 was thoroughly studied by three different groups at the University of Texas (Hubbard \emph{et al.}, 1972), Cornell University (Veverka \emph{et al.}, 1974) and at Paris-Meudon Observatory (Combes \emph{et al.}, 1971). Their results provided temperature profiles at the southern high latitudes, and allowed French and Gierasch (1974) to detect for the first time possible signatures of propagating gravity waves in a planetary atmosphere.

From the Meudon group lightcurves, we obtain new temperature profiles taking into account the advances in our knowledge about Jupiter's atmosphere since the data was first analyzed. Using the Continuous Wavelet Transform and techniques developed for the analysis of a more recent stellar occultation by Jupiter in 1999 (Raynaud \emph{et al.},submitted), we study the small scale fluctuations in the retrieved temperature profiles, calculate and compare their power spectrum to the 'universal' saturated gravity-wave power spectrum (Smith \emph{et al.},1987), and search for dominant wave modes and their parameters.

References : Combes \emph{et al.}, 1971, \emph{A&A}, \textbf{15}, 235-238. French and Gierasch, 1974, \emph{J.Atm.Sci.}, \textbf{31}, 1707-1712. Hubbard \emph{et al.}, 1972, \emph{Astron.J.}, \textbf{77}, 41-59. Smith \emph{et al.}, 1987, \emph{J.Atmos.Sci.}, \textbf{44}, 1404-1410. Veverka \emph{et al.}, 1974, \emph{Astron.J.}, \textbf{79}, 73-84.

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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 34, #3< br> © 2002. The American Astronomical Soceity.