Reevaluating how charged particles cause space weathering on airless bodies

Abstract

Many experiments have attempted to simulate how charged particles cause space weathering on airless bodies throughout the Solar System. Researchers have typically applied these experimental results by assuming that high laboratory fluxes cause the same effects as do the significantly lower fluxes found in nature. New work, however, shows that this assumption may often be invalid. In particular, experiments using charged particle fluences ≳1010 cm−2 without adequate steps to neutralize the targets risk causing dielectric breakdown, or “sparking”—a process that may affect some airless bodies. Consequently, it is critical to understand the laboratory conditions under which breakdown occurs, both to ensure that experiments properly simulate the effects of charged particles and to study the possibility that dielectric breakdown can, in some locations, contribute to space weathering.