Venus coordinated campaign

This site is intended as a tool to share information, comments and schedules for preparing the 2010 coordinated campaign of ground-based observations in the context of Venus Express and coming launch of Akatsuki mission.

The attached Google docs can be completed and modified according to the campaign progress.

Map (under construction)

To have a general view of the sites and telescopes which are used to ground-based observations about Venus, this is a googlemap which resume all differents observatories and their instruments.

• 2010 Venus Coordinated Campaign, Telescopes sites

Coordination

To prepare the campaign and coordinate telescope proposals with VEx MTPs, the attached table is under construction. Please do not hesitate to comment/modify and add more details on your plans.

2010 Venus Coordination

In-orbit observations

Venus Express

Instruments

• SPICAV/SOIR : Ultraviolet and Infrared Atmospheric Spectrometer

Atmospheric spectrometry by star or Sun occultation

UV 0.11 - 0.3 µm R ~ 300

IR 0.7 - 1.7 µm R ~ 1300

SOIR 2.3 - 4.2 µm R ~ 15000

• VeRa : Venus Radio Science Experiment

Radio sounding of atmosphere

• VIRTIS : Ultraviolet/Visible/Near-Infrared mapping spectrometer

Spectrographic mapping of atmosphere and surface

• VIRTIS-M mapping spectrometer

Vis 0.25 - 1.0 µm R ~ 100 - 200 ( IR 1 - 5 µm R ~ 100 - 200 )

VIRTIS-H High-res

2 - 5 µm R ~ 1000 - 2000

• VMC : Venus Monitoring Camera

Ultraviolet and visible imaging

Filters :

UV 0.365 µm

Vis 0.513 µm

Near - IR1 0.965 µm

Near - IR2 1.010 µm

More about the Venus Express Instruments

Akatsuki

The Project

The Venus Climate Orbiter mission (PLANET-C), one of the future planetary missions of Japan, aims at understanding the atmospheric circulation of Venus. Meteorological information will be obtained by globally mapping clouds and minor constituents successively with 4 cameras at ultraviolet and infrared wavelengths, detecting lightning with a high-speed imager, and observing the vertical structure of the atmosphere with radio science technique. The equatorial elongated orbit with westward revolution fits the observations of the movement and temporal variation of the Venusian atmosphere which rotates westward. The systematic, continuous imaging observations will provide us with an unprecedented large dataset of the Venusian atmospheric dynamics. Additional targets of the mission are the exploration of the ground surface and the observation of zodiacal light. The mission will complement the ESA's Venus Express, which also explores the Venusian environment with different approaches.

extract of: http://www.stp.isas.jaxa.jp/venus/top_english.html

The project, a link to JAXA

Instruments

• IR1: 1-micron Camera

1.01µm cloud (day-night), surface (nightside)

• IR2: 2-micron Camera

1.73, 2.26, 2.32 (near-IR) 2.02 (CO2), 1.65µm

• UVI: Ultraviolet Imager

283, 365 nm SO2 - UV absorber (dayside)

• LIR: Longwave Infrared Camera

10 µm cloud top (day/nightside)

• LAC: Lightning and Airglow Camera

Filters 777, 557, 553, 558, 630 nm O2/O airglow (night) lightning (night)

More about the Akatsuki Instruments

Coming meetings

• Venus Conference, Aussois (France), 20-26 June 2010
• « After-Aussois Venus 2010 » workshop: 1st strategic workshop on Coordinated ground-based measurements and modeling of the Venus atmosphere, Paris Observatory, June 28-29, 2010