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Preparing for X/Ka Band radio occultations of Venus with VERITAS and EnVision: Retrieving Sulfur Species Abundances
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  • Alex Akins,
  • Panagiotis Vergados,
  • Tatiana Bocanegra-Bahamon,
  • Chi Ao,
  • Robert Preston,
  • Sami Asmar
Alex Akins
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Corresponding Author:alexander.akins@jpl.nasa.gov

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Panagiotis Vergados
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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Tatiana Bocanegra-Bahamon
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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Chi Ao
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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Robert Preston
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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Sami Asmar
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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Abstract

The recently selected VERITAS and EnVision missions will fly with X and Ka Band telecommunications channels, permitting dual band radio occultations of the Venus atmosphere. While signal absorption measurements during S and X Band radio occultations of Venus in the past have been used to retrieve vertical abundances of H2SO4 vapor as a function of latitude, Ka Band links have yet to be employed to sound the neutral atmosphere. Laboratory measurements and propagation models of the Venus atmosphere suggest that H2SO4 cloud aerosols/vapor and SO2 absorb radio signals differently between X and Ka bands, permitting inversion of their abundance profiles down to the attenuation limit near 45 km. Such measurements would be of great value to the study of Venus atmospheric chemistry and dynamics. While the bulk abundance of SO2 at the cloud base has been inferred from microwave/infrared radiometry and from X Band occultations, Ka Band measurements could be used to derive vertically resolved profiles at the deepest altitudes yet, spanning a region where the abundance of SO2 changes by several orders of magnitude. Vertical profiles of lower cloud bulk density could also be achieved at higher resolution than any prior remote measurements. This presentation will discuss approaches to retrieving H2SO4 vapor/aerosol, and SO2 abundances using dual X/Ka Band radio occultations of the Venus neutral atmosphere. H2SO4 vapor can be retrieved with very high accuracy, surpassing that of prior single frequency occultations. Due to the relatively low (high) X (Ka) Band opacity of both SO2 and H2SO4 aerosols, retrievals of these species from dual band occultations are highly degenerate. To improve accuracy, we find that it is necessary to incorporate the results of chemical and dynamical modeling as prior information. At lower latitudes and in regions of high abundance, preliminary results suggest retrievals of SO2 profiles can be accomplished within 15-20% uncertainty. This error increases at higher latitudes, where models of cloud bulk density span a wider range of predictions. We compare the effects of various assumptions on the accuracy of the resulting retrievals, and discuss prospects for coupling a chemical/dynamics model to the retrieval process.