Abstract
Acoustic coupling between solid Earth and atmosphere has been observed since the 1960s, first from ground-based seismic, pressure, and ionospheric sensors and since 20 years with various satellite measurements, including with global positioning system (GPS) satellites. This coupling leads to the excitation of the Rayleigh surface waves by local atmospheric sources such as large natural explosions from volcanoes, meteor atmospheric air-bursts, or artificial explosions. It contributes also in the continuous excitation of Rayleigh waves and associated normal modes by atmospheric winds and pressure fluctuations. The same coupling allows the observation of Rayleigh waves in the thermosphere most of the time through ionospheric monitoring with Doppler sounders or GPS. The authors review briefly in this paper observations made on Earth and describe the general frame of the theory enabling the computation of Rayleigh waves for models of telluric planets with atmosphere. The authors then focus on Mars and Venus and give in both cases the atmospheric properties of the Rayleigh normal modes and associated surface waves compared to Earth. The authors then conclude on the observation perspectives especially for Rayleigh waves excited by atmospheric sources on Mars and for remote ionospheric observations of Rayleigh waves excited by quakes on Venus.
Highlights
Rayleigh surface waves correspond to the largest amplitudes recorded on long period seismograms
We conclude by a discussion on the perspective to detect from Venus orbit these signals for future orbital missions and to detect on Mars Rayleigh waves generated by atmospheric sources
Comparable observations remain to be done on other planets, but we can expect this to be the case in the decade
Summary
Rayleigh surface waves correspond to the largest amplitudes recorded on long period seismograms. New generation high frequency (HF) sounders are able to monitor such signals for quakes larger than 6.5 in moment magnitude (Artru et al, 2004) and signals have been observed by overthe-horizon systems, including for the R2 Rayleigh wave of the Ms 1⁄4 8.6 Sumatra Earthquake in 2005, which reached France after about 30 000 km of distance (Occhipinti et al, 2010). We first recall the theory able to take into account these coupling effects by an explicit calculation of the normal modes of the solid part of any planet model with a realistic atmospheric model, following the theory developed by Lognonne et al (1998) This is first done for Earth and for Mars and Venus, in the latter case taking into account the specific attenuation processes in the atmosphere of these planets associated to their CO2 atmosphere. We conclude by a discussion on the perspective to detect from Venus orbit these signals for future orbital missions and to detect on Mars Rayleigh waves generated by atmospheric sources
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