Auroral and Non-Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck-NIRSPEC and IRTF-iSHELL

Emma M. Thomas; Tom S. Stallard; Henrik Melin; Mohammad N. Chowdhury; Luke Moore; James O'Donoghue; Rosie E. Johnson; Ruoyan Wang; Katie L. Knowles; Paola I. Tiranti; Neil Dello Russo; Ron J. Vervack Jr; Hideyo Kawakita

doi:10.1029/2024GL112001

Auroral and Non-Auroral H3⁺ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck-NIRSPEC and IRTF-iSHELL

Emma M. Thomas^*, Tom S. Stallard, Henrik Melin, Mohammad N. Chowdhury, Luke Moore, James O'Donoghue, Rosie E. Johnson, Ruoyan Wang, Katie L. Knowles, Paola I. Tiranti, Neil Dello Russo, Ron J. Vervack Jr, Hideyo Kawakita

^*Corresponding author for this work

Department of Physics

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H-3(+) emission lines were used to derive dawn-to-dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H-3(+) column densities up to 6.0 x 10(16) m(-2). While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 1420014 and a 718016.

Original language	English
Article number	e2024GL112001
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Volume	52
Issue number	7
Early online date	01 Apr 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GL112001
Publication status	Published - 16 Apr 2025

Keywords

Uranus
infrared aurorae
H-3(+)
infrared spectrscopy
ground-based astronomy
ice giant ionosphere

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10.1029/2024GL112001Licence: CC BY

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Auroral and Non-Auroral H3+ ion winds at Uranus with Keck-NIRSPEC and IRTF-iSHELL
Thomas, E. M., Stallard, T. S., Melin, H., Chowdhury, M. N., Moore, L., O'Donoghue, J., Johnson, R. E., Wang, R., Knowles, K. L., Tiranti, P. I., Russo, N. D., Vervack, R. J. & Kawakita, H., 28 Nov 2024, ESS Open Archive.
Research output: Working paper › Preprint

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Cite this

Thomas, E. M., Stallard, T. S., Melin, H., Chowdhury, M. N., Moore, L., O'Donoghue, J., Johnson, R. E., Wang, R., Knowles, K. L., Tiranti, P. I., Dello Russo, N., Vervack Jr, R. J., & Kawakita, H. (2025). Auroral and Non-Auroral H3⁺ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck-NIRSPEC and IRTF-iSHELL. Geophysical Research Letters, 52(7), Article e2024GL112001. https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GL112001

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abstract = "To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H-3(+) emission lines were used to derive dawn-to-dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H-3(+) column densities up to 6.0 x 10(16) m(-2). While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 1420014 and a 718016.",

keywords = "Uranus, infrared aurorae, H-3(+), infrared spectrscopy, ground-based astronomy, ice giant ionosphere",

author = "Thomas, {Emma M.} and Stallard, {Tom S.} and Henrik Melin and Chowdhury, {Mohammad N.} and Luke Moore and James O'Donoghue and Johnson, {Rosie E.} and Ruoyan Wang and Knowles, {Katie L.} and Tiranti, {Paola I.} and {Dello Russo}, Neil and {Vervack Jr}, {Ron J.} and Hideyo Kawakita",

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T1 - Auroral and Non-Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck-NIRSPEC and IRTF-iSHELL

AU - Thomas, Emma M.

AU - Stallard, Tom S.

AU - Melin, Henrik

AU - Chowdhury, Mohammad N.

AU - Moore, Luke

AU - O'Donoghue, James

AU - Johnson, Rosie E.

AU - Wang, Ruoyan

AU - Knowles, Katie L.

AU - Tiranti, Paola I.

AU - Dello Russo, Neil

AU - Vervack Jr, Ron J.

AU - Kawakita, Hideyo

PY - 2025/4/16

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N2 - To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H-3(+) emission lines were used to derive dawn-to-dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H-3(+) column densities up to 6.0 x 10(16) m(-2). While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 1420014 and a 718016.

AB - To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H-3(+) emission lines were used to derive dawn-to-dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H-3(+) column densities up to 6.0 x 10(16) m(-2). While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 1420014 and a 718016.

KW - Uranus

KW - infrared aurorae

KW - H-3(+)

KW - infrared spectrscopy

KW - ground-based astronomy

KW - ice giant ionosphere

U2 - 10.1029/2024GL112001

DO - 10.1029/2024GL112001

M3 - Article

SN - 0094-8276

VL - 52

JO - Geophysical Research Letters

JF - Geophysical Research Letters

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M1 - e2024GL112001

ER -