Parker Solar Probe, Take the Solar Plunge |
Parker Solar Probe, Take the Solar Plunge |
Dec 25 2005, 12:33 AM
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#101
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Any serious plans to send a probe into the Sun to explore its depths as far as possible?
What would help a probe last as long as it could and how deep could it get? Could it even radio or laser out any data? What about a Sun skimmer? -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Feb 26 2021, 05:07 PM
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#102
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1669 Joined: 5-March 05 From: Boulder, CO Member No.: 184 |
I wonder which IR wavelengths would be involved as it could indicate whether one could see either heat emissions, or sunlight scattered through the Venusian clouds. In this case we're looking at the night side, so it must be the heat emissions. The surface of Venus is so hot though that its IR emissions would peak at a relatively short wavelength, that would actually overlap somewhat with the solar spectrum around roughly 3 microns. A look at the atmospheric transmittance spectrum would be of interest.
-------------------- Steve [ my home page and planetary maps page ]
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Feb 26 2021, 09:49 PM
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#103
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2530 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 321 |
On Venus, the temperature varies very linearly with altitude. The atmosphere itself radiates in IR, but the surface is still much, much denser than even Venus's dense atmosphere, so what we primarily see is a measure of the altitude. It's been established that the thermal IR signature for the surface corresponds to about 1 micron. 2+ microns moves the observation vertically upward into the atmosphere, and examines structure in clouds. (I was pleased, in early 2020, to join the ranks of amateurs who have imaged the surface of Venus looking through the nightside clouds at 1 micron.)
What makes this more complicated is that there are windows in the atmosphere (of course, primarily CO2) that pass IR better than others. The planned emissivity observations that would take place in any of the proposed remote sensing missions to Venus would take advantage of these. I have to say that I'm quite surprised that the PSP imager achieved this level of signal pertaining to the surface of Venus. The detail is certainly there in certain narrow bands, but with a wide-band filter I would expect the noise to overwhelm the signal. I'm perplexed that PSP would achieve such a clear signal by accident, because it's quite difficult to do when trying to do so. One advantage for PSP vs. an earthbound observer is that from certain vantage points close to Venus and over its nightside, one can avoid much of the glare from the crescent of the dayside. Even a very slim crescent at the intense illumination of Venus's clouds can glare and ruin the image over much of the nightside. |
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