Ganymede's Far‐Ultraviolet Reflectance: Constraining Impurities in the Surface Ice

Abstract

AbstractWe present reflectance spectra of Ganymede's leading and trailing hemispheres in the wavelength range 138–215 nm, obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (HST/COS) in 2014. The most notable feature of both spectra is the absence of a sharp water absorption edge at ~165 nm, seen in laboratory measurements of ice reflectivity and in previous observations of Saturn's icy moons and rings. Rather than displaying a sharp change in the reflectivity at the wavelength of the water ice absorption edge, Ganymede's reflectance gradually increases with wavelength at λ > 165 nm. We show that the observed shape of Ganymede's UV reflectance is inconsistent with intimate mixture models of pure ice with UV‐dark materials including tholins, amorphous carbon, graphite, and silicates. However, we find that intraparticle models, in which a small proportion of a UV‐absorbing contaminant is trapped as inclusions within the ice matrix, are able to suppress the 165 nm feature at contaminant concentrations of <1%. We show that models of ice with inclusions of silicates, Triton‐type tholin, or H2O2 are able to produce the observed gradual increase in reflectivity at λ > 165 nm, but additional absorbing surface materials are required to produce a good fit to Ganymede's previously observed near‐UV and visible reflectance.