Bibcode
Popescu, Marcel; de León, Julia; Pantelimon Prodan, George; Küppers, Michael; Kovács, Gábor; Nagy, Balázs Vince; Grieger, Björn; Escalante López, Alfredo; Sugita, Seiji; Kohout, Tomáš; Korda, David; Tatsumi, Eri; Lazzarin, Monica; Farina, Andrea; Poggiali, Giovanni; Bickel, Valentin T.; Raducan, Sabina D.; Licandro, Javier; Palomba, Ernesto; Michel, Patrick
Referencia bibliográfica
EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting 2025 (EPSC-DPS2025
Fecha de publicación:
9
2025
Número de citas
0
Número de citas referidas
0
Descripción
On March 12, 2025, the ESA Hera mission performed a flyby of Mars on the way to its target, the binary asteroid system Didymos-Dimorphos. This event provided a unique opportunity to acquire spectral data (within the 0.65-0.96 micron wavelength range) and high-resolution images of the far side of the Martian moon Deimos. The observations were conducted using the HyperScout-H (HS-H) instrument, the hyperspectral imager aboard the Hera spacecraft. Simultaneously, the mission's other two instruments, the Asteroid Framing Cameras (AFC) and the Thermal Infrared Imager (TIRI), also collected data on this small, irregularly shaped natural satellite of Mars.Fig.1 A false-color image of Mars and Deimos was generated for public outreach using observations acquired by the HS-H instrument. In this visualization, the color channels were shifted: blue corresponds to 0.65 µm, while red represents 0.96 µm. Deimos appears black due to albedo differences compared to Mars surface.The composition and geomorphology of Deimos have remained unclear despite multiple observations acquired over recent decades. Images obtained by various Mars missions reveal a low-albedo object (~0.08), while spectra acquired from both Earth-based observatories and space missions resemble those of C-, X-, and D-type asteroids (e.g., Fraeman et al. 2014; Takir et al. 2021). Furthermore, Deimos is tidally locked with Mars, orbiting at 6.92 Mars radii on an almost circular orbit (eccentricity 0.00024), inclined at 1.79° (with respect to equatorial plane). These properties are the key point for understanding the origin of this natural satellite. The leading hypotheses are: (1) asteroid capture, suggested by its spectral similarity to carbonaceous asteroids; and (2) formation from a giant impact, supported by the regularity of its orbit (e.g., Kuramoto 2024 and references there in).The HS-H instrument acquired three images of Deimos. The highest-resolution image (Fig. 1) was obtained when the spacecraft was at a distance of 1024 km from the object, at a phase angle of approximately 15°. Two additional lower-resolution images were captured before, from distances of 8800 km and 6200 km and at phase angles of 2-3°.The HS-H instrument is based on a 5 × 5 pattern of narrowband filters (defining a macropixel) placed and repeated over the CMOS detector pixels (referred to here as subpixels). This configuration enables the instrument to sample the spectrum of each surface patch between 0.65 and 0.96 microns across 25 spectral channels. As a result, HS-H simultaneously captures both spectral and imaging data. The highest-resolution image achieved a spatial resolution of approximately 134 meters per subpixel and primarily covers the far side of Deimos, an area that had never before been imaged in these wavelengths.The raw images were processed using the HS-H instrument pipeline. Calibrations included bias and dark current subtraction, flat-field correction, and conversion to radiance factor (RADF). The result for the high-resolution image is shown in Fig. 2. Additionally, photometric corrections were applied to account for varying illumination conditions. Spectra corresponding to each macropixel were retrieved and analyzed in relation to the geomorphological properties of the surface. The spectra were compared with those reported by other instruments for Deimos inner side, such as the Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) aboard the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter mission. These results will be presented and discussed with regard to their implications for the history of Deimos.Fig. 2 Radiance factor for each subpixel (note that subpixels correspond to different wavelength channels arranged in a 5x5 pattern). References1. Fraeman A. A., et al. (2014), Icarus, 229, 196-205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2013.11.0212. Takir D., et al. (2022), Icarus, 371, 114691. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2021.1146913. Kuramoto K. (2024), Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences, 52(1), 495-519. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-040522-110615