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R. K. Achterberg (SSAI), B. J. Conrath (Cornell U.), F. M. Flasar, A. A. Simon-Miller (NASA/GSFC), CIRS Team
Between February and August 2005, the Composite Infrared Spectrometer on Cassini will perform a series of mid-IR mapping observations of Saturn. Each observation covers a 10 degree latitude band for two rotations of Saturn, covering the spectral range from 600 to 1400 cm-1 (16.7 to 7.1 microns) at an apodised spectral resolution of 2.8 cm-1 and a spatial resolution of about 2 degrees of great circle arc. We are using the data from these observations to retrieve temperatures in the upper troposphere, between about 50 and 250 mbar, and the upper stratosphere, between 0.5 and 5 mbar. Zonal mean temperatures from the currently available data, covering latitudes from 25S to 85S, are consistent with results from lower spatial resolution data obtained in May 2004 during Saturn approach (Flasar et al., Science, 307, 1247--1251, 2005), although the tropospheric temperatures show latitudinal variations on a smaller scale than was resolvable in the earlier data. We will also present a periodogram analysis on the data to search for and characterize any planetary scale waves.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 37 #3
© 2004. The American Astronomical Soceity.