Spatial and temporal variations of Venus haze properties obtained from Pioneer Venus Orbiter polarimetry

Abstract

The spatial and temporal variations of the polarization of light scattered by Venus, as observed by the Pioneer Venus Orbiter between 1978 and 1990, is analyzed in terms of spatial and temporal variations of Venus upper haze properties. Special attention is given to choosing maps with sufficiently accurate geometrical information. This selection involves multiple‐scattering calculations for a number of reasonable models for the Venus atmosphere. For a set of observations in four wavelength bands of the Venus disk as a whole or a particular region thereof, observed values of Stokes parameters I and Q were used to obtain the average observed relative Stokes parameter qobs. Subsequently, the haze particle column density and the cloud top pressure were iteratively adjusted until values of qobs at two wavelengths were reproduced. For the planet as a whole, it was found that the haze particle column density decreased gradually during the Pioneer Venus Orbiter mission, whereas little significant temporal variability was found for the cloud top pressure. Similar long‐term behavior was derived for selected regions of Venus. Regions at higher latitudes exhibited higher values of both the haze particle column density and the cloud top pressure than regions at lower latitudes. Something similar holds for regions with low solar elevations as compared to regions in which the Sun was close to the zenith.