Creating Superresolution Spectra from Titan’s Equatorial Dunes

Overview

Titan, a moon of Saturn, is the most Earth-like body in the solar system. Titan hosts lakes, dunes, craters, and an atmosphere, which means that Titan is an Earth-like environment. NASA sent Cassini to observe Titan more closely. Onboard Cassini, the Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) was used to measure Titan’s surface composition in infrared wavelengths. Infrared wavelengths are necessary, as the atmosphere obscures all visible light. However, systematic instrument error caused the peak sensitivity wavelength value of each VIMS channel to shift. In other words, there was an increasing calibration gap between the wavelengths it was measuring and the wavelengths it was designed to measure. This study focuses on the development and implementation of a technique to leverage this behavior to create a higher-resolution spectrum of Titan’s equatorial dunes. The technique involves removing the effect of the atmosphere on the data, and then applying all the shifts of the spectrometer to the dataset. Even without being able to remove the effect of the atmosphere on the data, the results still showed a fivefold increase in the resolution of VIMS. This shows promise for future correction algorithms.

Competition history

• JSHS 2023 Category not listed

Resources

• National JSHS abstract book ↗

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