Issue |
A&A
Volume 521, October 2010
Herschel/HIFI: first science highlights
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | L50 | |
Number of page(s) | 5 | |
Section | Letters | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201015161 | |
Published online | 01 October 2010 |
Herschel/HIFI: first science highlights
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Water production in comet 81P/Wild 2 as determined by Herschel/HIFI
,![[*]](/icons/foot_motif.png)
M. de Val-Borro1 - P. Hartogh1 - J. Crovisier2 - D. Bockelée-Morvan2 - N. Biver2 - D. C. Lis3 - R. Moreno2 - C. Jarchow1 - M. Rengel1 - S. Szutowicz4 - M. Banaszkiewicz4 - F. Bensch5 - M. I. Becka4 - M. Emprechtinger3 - T. Encrenaz2 - E. Jehin6 - M. Küppers7 - L.-M. Lara8 - E. Lellouch2 - B. M. Swinyard9 - B. Vandenbussche10 - E. A. Bergin11 - G. A. Blake3 - J. A. D. L. Blommaert10 - J. Cernicharo12 - L. Decin10,13 - P. Encrenaz14 - T. de Graauw15,16,17 - D. Hutsemékers6 - M. Kidger18 - J. Manfroid6 - A. S. Medvedev1 - D. A. Naylor19 - R. Schieder20 - D. Stam15 - N. Thomas21 - C. Waelkens10 - R. Szczerba22 - P. Saraceno23 - A. M. Di Giorgio23 - S. Philipp24 - T. Klein24 - V. Ossenkopf20,15 - P. Zaal15 - R. Shipman15
1 -
Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung, 37191
Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany
2 - LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, 5 place Jules Janssen, 92195
Meudon, France
3 - California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
4 - Space Research Centre, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw,
Poland
5 - DLR, German Aerospace Centre, Bonn-Oberkassel, Germany
6 - Institut d'Astrophysique et de Geophysique, Université de Liège,
Belgium
7 - Rosetta Science Operations Centre, European Space Astronomy
Centre, European Space Agency, Spain
8 - Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (CSIC), Spain
9 - STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Harwell Innovation
Campus, Didcot, OX11 0QX, UK
10 - Instituut voor Sterrenkunde, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven,
Belgium
11 - Astronomy Department, University of Michigan, USA
12 - Laboratory of Molecular Astrophysics, CAB-CSIC, INTA, Spain
13 - Sterrenkundig Instituut Anton Pannekoek, University of Amsterdam,
Science Park 904, 1098 Amsterdam, The Netherlands
14 - LERMA, Observatoire de Paris, France
15 - SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Landleven 12, 9747
AD, Groningen, The Netherlands
16 - Leiden Observatory, University of Leiden, The Netherlands
17 - Joint ALMA Observatory, Chile
18 - Herschel Science Centre, European Space Astronomy
Centre, European Space Agency, Spain
19 - Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Lethbridge,
Canada
20 - KOSMA, I. Physik. Institut, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Str.
77, 50937 Köln, Germany
21 - Physikalisches Institut, University of Bern, Switzerland
22 - N. Copernicus Astronomical Center, Rabianska 8, 87-100, Torun,
Poland
23 - Istituto Fisica Spazio Interplanetario-INAF, via Fosso del
Cavaliere 100, 00133 Roma, Italy
24 - Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, 53121
Bonn, Germany
Received 5 June 2010 / Accepted 1 July 2010
Abstract
The high spectral resolution and sensitivity of
Herschel/HIFI allows for the detection of multiple rotational water
lines and accurate determinations of water production rates in comets.
In this Letter we present HIFI observations of the fundamental 110-101
(557 GHz) ortho and 111-000 (1113 GHz) para rotational transitions of
water in comet 81P/Wild 2 acquired in February 2010. We mapped the extent
of the water line emission with five point scans. Line profiles are
computed using excitation models which include excitation by collisions
with electrons and neutrals and solar infrared radiation. We derive a
mean water production rate of
molecules s-1 at a
heliocentric distance of 1.61 AU about 20 days before perihelion, in
agreement with production rates measured from the ground using
observations of the 18-cm OH lines. Furthermore, we constrain the
electron density profile and gas kinetic temperature, and estimate the
coma expansion velocity by fitting the water line shapes.
Key words: comets: individual: 81P/Wild 2 - molecular processes - radiative transfer - submillimeter: general
1 Introduction
Water is the main volatile constituent of cometary comae. Thus it is crucial to determine the water production rate to understand cometary activity and determine the relative abundances of other volatiles in the coma (see e.g. Bockelée-Morvan 1987). Water molecules in cometary atmospheres are excited by collisions with neutrals and electrons, and radiative pumping of the fundamental vibrational levels by the solar infrared radiation. The fundamental 110-101 ortho-water transition at 556.936 GHz is one of the strongest lines in cometary spectra. This transition has been detected using the Submillimeter Wave Astronomical Satellite (SWAS) (Neufeld et al. 2000), and subsequently with Odin (Lecacheux et al. 2003; Biver et al. 2007,2009) and the Herschel Space Observatory (Hartogh et al. 2010). Herschel provided the first detection of the 212-101 (1669.905 GHz) ortho and 111-000 (1113.343 GHz) para transitions of water in cometary atmospheres (Hartogh et al. 2010). The continuum emission in comet C/2006 W3 (Christensen) has been measured by Herschel (Bockelée-Morvan et al. 2010).
Comet 81P/Wild 2 is a Jupiter family comet that was the target of NASA's
Stardust sample return mission (Brownlee et al. 2004).
Thousands of particles in the submillimeter size range were collected
for laboratory study during the Stardust flyby on January 2, 2004
(Brownlee et al. 2006). Optical images of the nucleus
obtained by the navigation camera show very complex
topographic features (Brownlee et al. 2004). Gas production rates
for several molecules have been monitored at multiple apparitions
(Farnham & Schleicher 2005; Osip et al. 1992; Mäkinen et al. 2001; Fink et al. 1999).
A maximum water production rate of
is estimated from narrowband photometry of OH emission in the
near-UV (Farnham & Schleicher 2005).
The Heterodyne Instrument for the Far-Infrared (HIFI) onboard Herschel is well suited to observe water vapor in cometary coma with high spectral resolution (Pilbratt et al. 2010; de Graauw et al. 2010). Comet 81P/Wild 2 was observed with HIFI on February 1-4, 2010, in the framework of the Herschel guaranteed time key project ``Water and related chemistry in the Solar System'' (Hartogh et al. 2009).
Table 1: HIFI observations of water vapour in comet 81P/Wild 2 and derived water production rates.
2 HIFI observations
Comet 81P/Wild 2 passed its perihelion on February 22.7 UT at
AU from the Sun. The Herschel observations took place in
early February about 20 days before perihelion, at heliocentric distance
AU and a distance of
AU from
Herschel. The comet could not be observed after February 14 due to
visibility constraints. HIFI can observe two polarizations
simultaneously. With a spectral resolution of 1.1 MHz (wide band
spectrometer; WBS) or 140 KHz (high resolution spectrometer; HRS) HIFI
can resolve spectrally cometary line shapes and asymmetries
(Hartogh et al. 2010).
Table 1 shows a summary of the HIFI observations of the
110-101 (557 GHz, HIFI bands 1a and 1b) and 111-000 (1113 GHz, HIFI
band 4b) water lines in comet 81P/Wild 2. The position of the comet and
its relative motion with respect to Herschel were calculated using
the JPL's HORIZONS system.
The Herschel telescope has a diameter of 3.5 m, with the
corresponding HIFI half power beam widths (HPBW) of
and
at 1113, and 557 GHz, respectively. The
corresponding beam sizes projected on the comet are 1.5 and
km, respectively.
Observations were conducted in the standard dual beam switch (DBS) cross
map observing mode with a chopper speed of 4 Hz and a separation of the
cross positions corresponding to a Nyquist sampling of the beam size
(22
,
19
,
and 10
for observations in bands 1a,
1b, and 4b, respectively). One axis of the cross was aligned along the
Sun direction at PA =
.
The reference OFF position was
from the position of the comet. This observing mode was not
released at the time of the observations.
3 Data analysis
3.1 Water line emission
The data were reduced to the level 2 products using the standard
Herschel interactive processing environment (HIPE) 3.0
pipeline for HIFI (de Graauw et al. 2010). Integrated line
intensities and velocity offsets in the comet rest frame are given
in Table 1 for the central point in the maps.
Line intensities are calculated from the weighted averages of
spectra in horizontal (H) and vertical (V) polarizations. We scaled the
main beam brightness temperature using the beam efficiency of the
Herschel telescope of 0.7 and 0.75 for the 1113 and 557 GHz
lines respectively (see e.g. Hartogh et al. 2010). The uncertainties
in line intensity, velocity shift and water production rates are 1-
statistical uncertainties. Uncertainties in the sideband gain ratio,
which reach 5% (Roelfsema et al. 2010), are considered in the data
analysis.
![]() |
Figure 1:
Central point in the DBS map of the ortho-water
line at 556.936 GHz in comet 81P/Wild 2 obtained by the HRS on February
4.24 UT.
The velocity scale is given with respect to the comet rest frame
with a resolution of |
Open with DEXTER |
![]() |
Figure 2:
Average of the HRS observations of the para-water line at 1113.343 GHz
towards the nucleus of comet 81P/Wild 2 obtained on February 2.13 UT
and 2.15 UT.
The velocity resolution is |
Open with DEXTER |
Figure 1 shows the HRS spectrum of the 110-101 ortho-water
line at 557 GHz observed on February 4.24 UT at the center of the
map. The central spectrum of the map of the 111-000 para-water line
at 1113 GHz, averaging the two observations to increase the
signal-to-noise ratio, is shown in Fig. 2. These spectra
are uniformly weighted averages of the H and V polarizations. They
correspond also to the average of the central points of the horizontal
and vertical drifts of the cross map. The frequency scale of the
observed spectra was corrected for the geocentric velocity of the comet
and the spacecraft orbital velocity. The lines are optically thick and
slightly asymmetric due to self-absorption effects in the foreground
coma. We estimate a mean expansion velocity
from the width of the 557 GHz line (Biver et al. 2007).
Expansion velocities in the range
are
typical for weak comets.
Mapping observations at 557 and 1113 GHz are shown in Figs. 3 and 4, and Fig. 5.
![]() |
Figure 3:
DBS cross-map of the ortho-water 110-101 transition
obtained with the HRS on February 1.44 UT.
Offset positions are |
Open with DEXTER |
![]() |
Figure 4:
Average of the cross-maps of the 111-000 para-water
line obtained with the HRS on February 2.13 and 2.15 UT.
The offset spacing is |
Open with DEXTER |
3.2 Radiative transfer modelling
Molecular excitation in the outer coma is dominated by
collisions with electrons and infrared fluorescence by solar
radiation. We use a spherically symmetric Monte Carlo radiative
transfer numerical code to compute the populations of the water
rotational levels as function of the distance from the nucleus
(see Hartogh et al. 2010, and references therein). A constant gas
temperature of T
= 40 K is assumed. The ortho-to-para water ratio in comets varies
from 2.5 to 3 (e.g. Bonev et al. 2007, and references
therein). We assume a value of 3. The scaling
factor of the electron density profile with respect to a nominal
profile deduced from 1P/Halley in situ data is chosen to be
and 1. The former value was found to best explain the
brightness distribution of the 110-101 line obtained from
mapping observations (Hartogh et al. 2010; Biver et al. 2007).
The radiative transfer equation is solved along different lines of sight
through the coma covering
,
and the beam
averaged emission spectra are computed. We obtain the water production
rate by comparing the calculated and observed line intensities. The
synthetic line profiles agree approximately with the observed line
shapes (Figs. 1, 2). The differences (overall
shift and excess emission in the blue wing of the profiles) suggest
preferential outgassing towards the Sun and a day/night asymmetry in the
gas velocity field.
3.3 Water production rates
Mapping observations can be used to constrain excitation
parameters such as the neutral gas kinetic temperature and
electron density scaling factor. The spacing of
and
between the observed positions corresponds to
distances of
and
at the distance of the comet, respectively, where the excitation of the water
rotational levels is controlled both by collisions with electrons
and infrared fluorescence (see Fig. 5 in Hartogh et al. 2010).
Figure 6 shows the evolution of the line area of
the 557 and 1113 GHz lines as a function of the position
offset. As shown in Fig. 6, model calculations
performed with T = 40 K and
provide a satisfactory
fit to the observed radial brightness profiles. For a larger
electron content (
), the line intensities at the offset
positions are lower than observed. Production rates for
are consistent with values obtained from OH observations
(Crovisier et al., in prep.), while those for
are about a factor of two lower.
![]() |
Figure 6:
Intensities of the 110-101 (Feb. 1.44 UT, left panel) and 111-000 (Feb. 2.13-2.15 UT, right panel) lines as a function of position offset from the
estimated position of the peak brightness. Model calculations for
|
Open with DEXTER |
The water production rates derived from the 557 and 1113 GHz lines
are consistent with each other and in the range
.
Model calculations show that the
I(557 GHz)/I(1113 GHz) intensity ratio does not depend
strongly on the
parameter. Gas kinetic temperatures
T in the range 30-50 K provide a satisfactory fit of the
measured intensity ratio, averaging the lines observed at the
different dates and considering uncertainties in flux calibration.
Lower temperatures (by
15 K) are retrieved when the
ortho-to-para ratio is taken equal to 2.5. Such low T values are
typical for comets of relatively low activity. However, these
temperature retrievals are possibly affected by the
non-simultaneity of the observations.
![]() |
Figure 7:
Water production rates with 1- |
Open with DEXTER |
3.4 Comparison with observations of water photodissociation products
In support of the Herschel observations, the OH lines at 18-cm were observed with the Nançay radio telescope from November 16, 2009 to February 14, 2010 (Crovisier et al., in prep.). The methods of observation and analysis are described in Crovisier et al. (2002). The comet could be detected only after integrating over many days in December and January. It could not be detected close to perihelion because the OH maser inversion was small at that time. Water is the only significant parent molecule of the OH radical in cometary atmospheres and the lifetimes of the two species are well known, allowing for a determination of the water production rate (see e.g. Cochran & Schleicher 1993). The retrieved water production rates, including the HIFI retrievals, are shown in Fig. 7.
Figure 7 includes water production rates measured for the
1997 apparitions from OH narrowband photometry
(Farnham & Schleicher 2005),
spectroscopy of the 1D line of atomic oxygen (Fink et al. 1999) and
Lyman-
measurements made with the SWAN instrument onboard SOHO
(Mäkinen et al. 2001). The latter water production rates are about a
factor of two higher than those obtained from narrowband photometry of
OH emission (Farnham & Schleicher 2005).
The higher production ratesmeasured
80-20 days before perihelion may indicate a seasonal effect, with a
water production rate peak at
40-60 days pre-perihelion
(see e.g. Szutowicz et al. 2008).
4 Conclusions
Although comet 81P/Wild 2 has been extensively observed from the ground, it
is still poorly observed at sub-millimeter wavelengths. 81P/Wild 2 was
observed with HIFI in the period 1-4 February 2010 at 1.6 AU
heliocentric distance and 0.95 AU from Herschel. The fundamental
ortho- and para-water rotational transitions at 556.936 GHz and 1113.343
GHz were detected at high spectral resolution. DBS cross-maps were
obtained to study the excitation conditions throughout the coma. We
calculate a water production rate in the range
using a radiative transfer code which includes collisional effects
and infrared fluorescence by solar radiation. Water production rates are
in good agreement with those derived from ground-based observations of
the OH 18-cm emission at the Nançay radio telescope about 30 days
before perihelion.
HIFI has been designed and built by a consortium of institutes and university departments from across Europe, Canada and the United States under the leadership of SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Groningen, The Netherlands and with major contributions from Germany, France and the US. Consortium members are: Canada: CSA, U. Waterloo; France: CESR, LAB, LERMA, IRAM; Germany: KOSMA, MPIfR, MPS; Ireland, NUI Maynooth; Italy: ASI, IFSI-INAF, Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri-INAF; The Netherlands: SRON, TUD; Poland: CAMK, CBK; Spain: Observatorio Astronómico Nacional (IGN), Centro de Astrobiología (CSIC-INTA). Sweden: Chalmers University of Technology - MC2, RSS & GARD, Onsala Space Observatory, Swedish National Space Board, Stockholm University - Stockholm Observatory; Switzerland: ETH Zürich, FHNW; USA: Caltech, JPL, NHSC. HIPE is a joint development by the Herschel Science Ground Segment Consortium, consisting of ESA, the NASA Herschel Science Center, and the HIFI, PACS and SPIRE consortia. This development has been supported by national funding agencies: CEA, CNES, CNRS (France); ASI (Italy); DLR (Germany). Additional funding support for some instrument activities has been provided by ESA. Support for this work was provided by NASA through an award issued by JPL/Caltech. D.C.L. is supported by the NSF, award AST-0540882 to the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. S.S., M.B. and M.I.B. are supported by the Polish Ministry of Education and Science (MNiSW).
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Online Material
![]() |
Figure 5:
DBS cross-map of the 110-101 ortho-water line obtained
with the HRS on February 4.24 UT. The offset spacing is |
Open with DEXTER |
Footnotes
- ...Herschel/HIFI
- Herschel is an ESA space observatory with science instruments provided by European-led Principal Investigator consortia and with important participation from NASA.
- ...
- Figure 5 (page 5) is only available in electronic form at http://www.aanda.org
All Tables
Table 1: HIFI observations of water vapour in comet 81P/Wild 2 and derived water production rates.
All Figures
![]() |
Figure 1:
Central point in the DBS map of the ortho-water
line at 556.936 GHz in comet 81P/Wild 2 obtained by the HRS on February
4.24 UT.
The velocity scale is given with respect to the comet rest frame
with a resolution of |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 2:
Average of the HRS observations of the para-water line at 1113.343 GHz
towards the nucleus of comet 81P/Wild 2 obtained on February 2.13 UT
and 2.15 UT.
The velocity resolution is |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 3:
DBS cross-map of the ortho-water 110-101 transition
obtained with the HRS on February 1.44 UT.
Offset positions are |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 4:
Average of the cross-maps of the 111-000 para-water
line obtained with the HRS on February 2.13 and 2.15 UT.
The offset spacing is |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 6:
Intensities of the 110-101 (Feb. 1.44 UT, left panel) and 111-000 (Feb. 2.13-2.15 UT, right panel) lines as a function of position offset from the
estimated position of the peak brightness. Model calculations for
|
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 7:
Water production rates with 1- |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 5:
DBS cross-map of the 110-101 ortho-water line obtained
with the HRS on February 4.24 UT. The offset spacing is |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
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