North Polar Hexagon Research Articles

Energy Exchanges in Saturn's Polar Regions From Cassini Observations: Eddy-Zonal Flow Interactions.

Saturn's polar regions (polewards of ∼63° planetocentric latitude) are strongly dynamically active with zonal jets, polar cyclones and the intriguing north polar hexagon (NPH) wave. Here we analyze measurements of horizontal winds, previously obtained from Cassini images by Antuñano et al. (2015), https://doi.org/10.1002/2014je004709, to determine the spatial and spectral exchanges of kinetic energy (KE) between zonal mean zonal jets and nonaxisymmetric eddies in Saturn's polar regions. Eddies of most resolved scales generally feed KE into the eastward and westward zonal mean jets at rates between 4.3 × 10−5 and 1.4 × 10−4 W kg−1. In particular, the north polar jet (at 76°N) was being energized at a rate of ∼10−4 W kg−1, dominated by the contribution due to the zonal wavenumber m = 6 NPH wave itself. This implies that the hexagon was not being driven at this time through a barotropic instability of the north polar jet, but may suggest a significant role for baroclinic instabilities, convection or other internal energy sources for this feature. The south polar zonal mean jet KE was also being sustained by eddies in that latitude band across a wide range of m. In contrast, results indicate that the north polar vortex may have been weakly barotropically unstable at this time with eddies of low m gaining KE at the expense of the axisymmetric cyclone. However, the southern axisymmetric polar cyclone was gaining KE from non‐axisymmetric components at this time, including m = 2 and its harmonics, as the elliptical distortion of the vortex may have been decaying.

Saturn atmospheric dynamics one year after Cassini: Long-lived features and time variations in the drift of the Hexagon

We examine Saturn's atmospheric dynamics with observations in the visible range from ground-based telescopes and Hubble Space Telescope (HST). We present a detailed analysis of observations acquired during 2018 obtaining drift rates of major meteorological systems from the equator to the north polar hexagon. A system of polar storms that appeared in the planet in March 2018 and remained active with a complex phenomenology at least until September is analyzed elsewhere (Sánchez-Lavega et al., 2019). Many of the regular cloud features visible in 2018 are long-lived and can be identified in Saturn images in 2017, and in some cases, for up to a decade using also Cassini ISS images. Without considering the polar storms, the most interesting long-lived cloud systems are:i) A bright white spot in the Equatorial Zone that can be tracked continuously since 2014 with minimal changes in its zonal velocity, which was 444.3 ± 3.1 m s−1 in 2014 and 452.4 ± 1.7 m s−1 in 2018. This velocity is remarkably different from the zonal winds at the cloud level at its latitude during the Cassini mission, and is closer to zonal winds obtained at the time of the Voyagers flybys and to zonal winds from Cassini VIMS infrared images of the lower atmosphere.ii) A large long-lived Anticyclone Vortex, here AV, that formed after the Great White Spot of 2010–2011. This vortex has changed significantly in visual contrast, drift rate and latitude with minor changes in size over the last years.iii) A system of subpolar vortices at latitudes 60–65°N present at least since 2011. These vortices and additional atmospheric features here studied follow drift rates consistent with zonal winds obtained by Cassini.We also present a study of the positions of the vertices of Saturn's north polar hexagon from 2015 to 2018. These measurements are compared with previous analyses during the Cassini mission (2007–2014), observations with HST in the 90s, and data from the Voyagers in 1980–1981 to explore the long-term variability of the hexagon's drift rate. We find variations in the drift rate of the hexagon through these epochs that can not be fit by seasonal changes in the polar area. Instead, the different drift rates reinforce the role of the North Polar Spot that was present in the Voyager epoch and in the early 90s to cause a faster drift rate of the hexagon at that time compared with the current slower one.

Cassini UVIS Detection of Saturn's North Polar Hexagon in the Grand Finale Orbits

AbstractCassini's final orbits in 2016 and 2017 provided unprecedented spatial resolution of Saturn's polar regions from near‐polar spacecraft viewing geometries. Long‐wavelength channels of Cassini's Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph instrument detected Saturn's UV‐dark north polar hexagon near 180 nm at planetocentric latitudes near 75°N. The dark polar hexagon is surrounded by a larger, less UV‐dark collar poleward of planetocentric latitude 65°N associated with the dark north polar region seen in ground‐based images. The hexagon is closely surrounded by the main arc of Saturn's UV aurora. The UV‐dark material was locally darkest on one occasion (23 January 2017) at the boundary of the hexagon; in most Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph images the dark material more uniformly fills the hexagon. The observed UV‐dark stratospheric material may be a hydrocarbon haze produced by auroral ion‐neutral chemistry at submicrobar pressure levels. Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph polar observations are sensitive to UV‐absorbing haze particles at pressures lower than about 10–20 mbar.

Saturn's North Polar Hexagon

Saturn's North Polar Hexagon

On the dynamical nature of Saturn’s North Polar hexagon

An explanation of long-lived Saturn’s North Polar hexagonal circumpolar jet in terms of instability of the coupled system polar vortex - circumpolar jet is proposed in the framework of the rotating shallow water model, where scarcely known vertical structure of the Saturn’s atmosphere is averaged out. The absence of a hexagonal structure at Saturn’s South Pole is explained similarly. By using the latest state-of-the-art observed winds in Saturn’s polar regions a detailed linear stability analysis of the circumpolar jet is performed (i) excluding (“jet-only” configuration), and (2) including (“jet + vortex” configuration) the north polar vortex in the system. A domain of parameters: latitude of the circumpolar jet and curvature of its azimuthal velocity profile, where the most unstable mode of the system has azimuthal wavenumber 6, is identified. Fully nonlinear simulations are then performed, initialized either with the most unstable mode of small amplitude, or with the random combination of unstable modes. It is shown that developing barotropic instability of the “jet+vortex” system produces a long-living structure akin to the observed hexagon, which is not the case of the “jet-only” system, which was studied in this context in a number of papers in literature. The north polar vortex, thus, plays a decisive dynamical role. The influence of moist convection, which was recently suggested to be at the origin of Saturn’s North Polar vortex system in the literature, is investigated in the framework of the model and does not alter the conclusions.

A δ-plane simulation of anticyclones perturbing circumpolar flows to form a transient north polar hexagon

Saturn's North Polar Hexagon was discovered by Godfrey who pieced together map projections of images captured by the Voyager mission to unveil a hexagonal structure over the north pole of Saturn. This article attempts to answer whether or not a hexagonal structure can be formed through anticyclones impinging on the dominant eastward circumpolar flow and is in part based upon the proposed theory by Allison et al. that the Hexagon may be the result of at least one impinging anticyclone perturbing a circumpolar jet centrally located around the 76°N latitude. A high-latitude δ-plane approximation is used to simulate the interaction between an initially circular circumpolar jet and at least one perturbing anticyclone. Our simulations with one perturbing anticyclone failed to form a hexagonal structure; yet by including an additional anticyclone it was found that depending on the strength, location and radius of the perturbing anticyclones a hexagonal feature could develop. However, the longevity and drift rate of the actual Hexagon must be attributed to other factors not considered in this paper.

A laboratory model of Saturn’s North Polar Hexagon

A hexagonal structure has been observed at ∼76°N on Saturn since the 1980s (Godfrey, D.A. [1988]. Icarus 76, 335–356). Recent images by Cassini (Baines, K., Momary, T., Roos-Serote, M., Atreya, S., Brown, R., Buratti, B., Clark, R., Nicholson, P. [2007]. Geophys. Res. Abstr. 9, 02109; Baines, K., Momary, T., Fletcher, L., Kim, J., Showman, A., Atreya, S., Brown, R., Buratti, B., Clark, R., Nicholson, P. [2009]. Geophys. Res. Abstr. 11, 3375) have shown that the feature is still visible and largely unchanged. Its long lifespan and geometry has puzzled the planetary physics community for many years and its origin remains unclear. The measured rotation rate of the hexagon may be very close to that of the interior of the planet ( Godfrey, D.A. [1990]. Science 247, 1206–1208; Caldwell, J., Hua, X., Turgeon, B., Westphal, J.A., Barnet, C.D. [1993]. Science 206, 326–329; Sánchez-Lavega, A., Lecacheux, J., Colas, F., Laques, P. [1993]. Science 260, 329–332), leading to earlier interpretations of the pattern as a stationary planetary wave, continuously forced by a nearby vortex (Allison, M., Godfrey, D.A., Beebe, R.F. [1990]. Science 247, 1061–1063). Here we present an alternative explanation, based on an analysis of both spacecraft observations of Saturn and observations from laboratory experiments where the instability of quasi-geostrophic barotropic (vertically uniform) jets and shear layers is studied. We also present results from a barotropic linear instability analysis of the saturnian zonal wind profile, which are consistent with the presence of the hexagon in the North Pole and absence of its counter-part in the South Pole. We propose that Saturn’s long-lived polygonal structures correspond to wavemodes caused by the nonlinear equilibration of barotropically unstable zonal jets.

Hubble Space Telescope results in planetary science

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was placed into orbit by the Discovery shuttlecraft on April 25, 1990, and first light images were obtained on May 20, 1990 (Feinberg, 1990a; Palga, 1990). On June 26, NASA announced that the telescope suffered from spherical aberration and that , instead of focusing 70 percent of a star's light in an area 0.2 arcsec in diameter, the light was spread over an area with a diameter of 1.4 arcsec. The resulting point‐spread function (PSF) contained a 0.2 arc sec central spike that contained 15% of the light and, because the problem concerned two excellent yet mismatched mirrors, the resulting apron of the PSF could be represented by a predictable diffraction pattern, indicating that part of the resolution of the two cameras could be recovered by image deconvolution. As a part of the effort to assess the magnitude of the problem, the Wide Field/Planetary Camera (WFPC‐1) team obtained broad band blue, green and red images of Saturn on August 26, 1990 (Westphal et al, 1991). Using PSFs derived from a star for the 547 nm filter and theoretical PSFs for the 439 nm and 718 nm filters, the WFPC‐1 team used Lucy's algorithm (1974) to deconvolve the data and produced a composite three color image. This effort showed that a narrow gap, the Encke Division, in the outer ring could be resolved and produced an effective resolution of the deconvolved images that was better than the best groundbased results. Even with the focusing problems, this effective resolution ‐ combined with the fact that HST suffers less from scattered light, has UV sensitivity and yields the same resolution from observation to observation ‐ recommended it for planetary studies involving spatial and temporal variability. These initial observations revealed that Saturn's north polar hexagon, seen by Voyager (Allison et al, 1990), was visible, implying that it is not a transient feature. The latitudinal locations of belt‐zone interfaces differed from those recorded in 1981 Voyager images, indicating that seasonal or undetected sporadic convective activity had altered the reflective properties of the atmosphere.