THE MAIN GOAL OF THE PROPOSED WORK WILL BE TO OBTAIN A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE STRUCTURE OF THE PLANET SATURN AND ITS INTERIOR. RECENT RESULTS HAVE BEGUN TO YIELD IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE PLANET'S INTERNAL DYNAMICS. SPECIFICALLY OUR TEAM HAS IDENTIFIED MANY COHERENT STRUCTURES IN THE RINGS (MOSTLY DENSITY WAVES) GENERATED BY MASS ANOMALIES INSIDE THE PLANET INDICATING STRONG EVIDENCE OF DIFFERENTIAL ROTATION (EL MOUTAMID ET AL. 2018). OUR PHYSICAL INTERPRETATION SUGGESTS THAT THE NATURE OF THESE INTERNAL STRUCTURES MAY BE PERSISTENT ASYMMETRIES IN SATURN'S GRAVITATIONAL FIELD THAT MOVE WITH THE PLANET'S ROTATION. MOREOVER THESE STRUCTURES (DENSITY AND BENDING WAVES) ARE GENERATED BY THE SO-CALLED TESSERAL RESONANCES (EL MOUTAMID ET AL. 2018 SICARDY ET AL. 2018). WE PLAN TO LOOK FOR MANY TINY HIDDEN LOW-AMPLITUDES WAVES USING A WAVELET-BASED ANALYSES OF MANY SETS OF OCCULTATION PROFILES OBTAINED BY THE VIMS (VISIBLE AND INFRARED MAPPING SPECTROMETER) AT DIFFERENT EPOCHS. THESE STRUCTURES ARE NOT EASILY OBSERVED BUT WAVES FOR A GIVEN PATTERN SPEED CAN BE DETECTED IN PHASE AVERAGE WAVELETS. MOREOVER SATURN'S INTERIOR AND ITS DIFFERENTIAL ROTATION ARE UNKNOWN. USING OUR EXISTING CODES AND USING DATA FROM VIMS WE PLAN TO LOOK FOR MORE WAVES AND ANALYZE THEM WITH HIGH PRECISION WITH THE GOAL OF A BETTER CHARACTERIZING SATURN'S INTERIOR. MOREOVER SEVERAL OF THESE WAVES WITH PATTERN SPEEDS CLOSE TO SATURN'S ROTATION RATE HAVE BEEN MOVING INWARDS OVER THE COURSE OF THE CASSINI MISSION AT RATES OF AROUND 1 KILOMETER PER YEAR. THESE "DRIFTING WAVES" SUGGEST THAT THE FREQUENCIES OF THE RELEVANT DRIVING FORCES ARE INCREASING OVER TIME. HENCE SOME ASPECT OF SATURN'S INTERNAL STRUCTURE MUST BE SLOWLY CHANGING ON DECADAL TIMESCALES. THESE TASKS WILL ALLOW US TO HIGHLIGHT SATURN'S TESSERAL FIELD THEN LATER COMBINED WITH THE GRAVITATIONAL FIELD WILL BE AN IMPORTANT RESULT TO PROBE THE HIDDEN INTERIOR OF SATURN.
$342,213FY2020National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationNASA
Cornell University, Ithaca NY