High-resolution CASSINI-VIMS mosaics of Titan and the icy Saturnian satellites
Ralf Jaumann
(1)
,
Katrin Stephan
(1)
,
Robert H. Brown
(2)
,
B. J. Buratti
(3)
,
Roger N. Clark
(4)
,
Thomas B. Mccord
(5)
,
Angioletta Coradini
(6)
,
Fabrizio Capaccioni
(7)
,
Gianrico Filacchione
(7)
,
Priscilla Cerroni
(7)
,
Kevin H. Baines
(3)
,
Giancarlo Bellucci
(6)
,
Jean-Pierre Bibring
(8)
,
Michel Combes
(9, 10)
,
Dale P. Cruikshank
(11)
,
Pierre Drossart
(9, 10)
,
Vittorio Formisano
(6)
,
Yves Langevin
(8)
,
Dennis L. Matson
(3)
,
Robert M. Nelson
(3)
,
Philip D. Nicholson
(12)
,
Bruno Sicardy
(9, 10)
,
Christophe Sotin
(13)
,
Laurence A. Soderblom
(14)
,
Caitlin A. Griffith
(15)
,
K.-D. Matz
(1)
,
Th. Roatsch
(1)
,
Frank Scholten
(1)
,
Carolyn C. Porco
(16)
1
DLR Institut für Planetenerkundung
2 Department Planetary Science and LPL, University of AZ, Tucson
3 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
4 US Geological Survey, Denver
5 Planetary Science Institute, 22 Fiddler's Rd., Winthrop
6 Istituto Fisica Spazio Interplanetario, INAF
7 Instituto di Astrofisica Spaziale - CNR, Area della recerca di Tor Vergata
8 IAS - Institut d'astrophysique spatiale
9 LESIA - Laboratoire d'études spatiales et d'instrumentation en astrophysique
10 Pôle Planétologie du LESIA
11 NASA Ames Research Center, Astrophysics Branch, Moffett Field
12 Department of Astronomy, Cornell University
13 UN - Université de Nantes
14 US Geological Survey, Flagstaff
15 LPL - Lunar and Planetary Laboratory [University of Arizona]
16 Space Science Institute, Boulder
2 Department Planetary Science and LPL, University of AZ, Tucson
3 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
4 US Geological Survey, Denver
5 Planetary Science Institute, 22 Fiddler's Rd., Winthrop
6 Istituto Fisica Spazio Interplanetario, INAF
7 Instituto di Astrofisica Spaziale - CNR, Area della recerca di Tor Vergata
8 IAS - Institut d'astrophysique spatiale
9 LESIA - Laboratoire d'études spatiales et d'instrumentation en astrophysique
10 Pôle Planétologie du LESIA
11 NASA Ames Research Center, Astrophysics Branch, Moffett Field
12 Department of Astronomy, Cornell University
13 UN - Université de Nantes
14 US Geological Survey, Flagstaff
15 LPL - Lunar and Planetary Laboratory [University of Arizona]
16 Space Science Institute, Boulder
Résumé
The Visual Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) onboard the CASSINI spacecraft obtained new spectral data of the icy satellites of Saturn after its arrival at Saturn in June 2004. VIMS operates in a spectral range from 0.35 to 5.2 mum, generating image cubes in which each pixel represents a spectrum consisting of 352 contiguous wavebands. As an imaging spectrometer VIMS combines the characteristics of both a spectrometer and an imaging instrument. This makes it possible to analyze the spectrum of each pixel separately and to map the spectral characteristics spatially, which is important to study the relationships between spectral information and geological and geomorphologic surface features. The spatial analysis of the spectral data requires the determination of the exact geographic position of each pixel on the specific surface and that all 352 spectral elements of each pixel show the same region of the target. We developed a method to reproject each pixel geometrically and to convert the spectral data into map projected image cubes. This method can also be applied to mosaic different VIMS observations. Based on these mosaics, maps of the spectral properties for each Saturnian satellite can be derived and attributed to geographic positions as well as to geological and geomorphologic surface features. These map-projected mosaics are the basis for all further investigations.