@misc{10481/62110,
year = {2019},
month = {5},
url = {http://hdl.handle.net/10481/62110},
abstract = {Context. The tenuous nitrogen (N2) atmosphere on Pluto undergoes strong seasonal effects due to high obliquity and orbital eccentricity, and has recently (July 2015) been observed by the New Horizons spacecraft.

Aims. The main goals of this study are (i) to construct a well calibrated record of the seasonal evolution of surface pressure on Pluto and (ii) to constrain the structure of the lower atmosphere using a central flash observed in 2015.

Methods. Eleven stellar occultations by Pluto observed between 2002 and 2016 are used to retrieve atmospheric profiles (density, pressure, temperature) between altitude levels of ~5 and ~380 km (i.e. pressures from ~ 10 μbar to 10 nbar).

Results. (i) Pressure has suffered a monotonic increase from 1988 to 2016, that is compared to a seasonal volatile transport model, from which tight constraints on a combination of albedo and emissivity of N2 ice are derived. (ii) A central flash observed on 2015 June 29 is consistent with New Horizons REX profiles, provided that (a) large diurnal temperature variations (not expected by current models) occur over Sputnik Planitia; and/or (b) hazes with tangential optical depth of ~0.3 are present at 4–7 km altitude levels; and/or (c) the nominal REX density values are overestimated by an implausibly large factor of ~20%; and/or (d) higher terrains block part of the flash in the Charon facing hemisphere.},
organization = {European Research Council under the European Community’s H2020 2014-2020 ERC Grant Agreement n° 669416 “Lucky Star”},
organization = {Grants 427700/2018-3, 310683/2017-3 and 473002/2013-2) and FAPERJ (Grant E-26/111.488/2013)},
organization = {Grant AYA2017-89637-R. P.S.S. acknowledges financial support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, under Grant Agreement no 687378, as part of the project “Small Bodies Near and Far” (SBNAF)},
organization = {Financial support from the State Agency for Research of the Spanish MCIU through the “Center of Excellence Severo Ochoa” award for the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (SEV-2017-0709)},
organization = {Support process 309578/2017-5. G.B.R. thanks support from the grant CAPES-FAPERJ/PAPDRJ (E26/203.173/2016). J.I.B.C. acknowledges CNPq grant 308150/2016-3. R.V.M. thanks the grants: CNPq-304544/2017-5, 401903/2016-8, and Faperj: PAPDRJ-45/2013 and E-26/203.026/2015. B.M. thanks the CAPES/Cofecub-394/2016-05 grant and CAPES/Brazil – Finance Code 001.},
organization = {Grant FRFC 2.5.594.09.F, with the participation of the Swiss National Science Foundation (FNS/SNSF)},
organization = {Support from the Spanish Ministry Project AYA2015-71718-R (including EU funds)},
organization = {Support from the Italian Minister of Instruction, University and Research (MIUR) through FFABR 2017 fund and support from the University of Rome Tor Vergata through “Mission: Sustainability 2016” fund},
publisher = {EDP Sciences},
keywords = {Methods: observational},
keywords = {Methods: data analysis},
keywords = {Planets and satellites: atmospheres},
keywords = {Techniques: photometric},
keywords = {Planets and satellites: physical evolution},
keywords = {Planets and satellites: terrestrial planets},
title = {Lower atmosphere and pressure evolution on Pluto from ground-based stellar occultations, 1988–2016},
doi = {10.1051/0004-6361/201834281},
author = {Meza, E. and Ortiz Moreno, José Luis and Alonso Burgos, Sergio},
}