Planetary Science Seminar

I illustrate a Bayesian approach to nonlinear inversion which allows, upon selection of initial guesses for surface temperature and spectral emissivity, constrained by their expected range of variability, to simultaneously compute them from the measured spectral radiance. The results obtained by applying this method to hyperspectral imaging data obtained by the ESA Rosetta and NASA Dawn spacecrafts will be shown in the following: in particular, I will discuss spatially-resolved thermal images and maps obtained by the VIRTIS imaging spectrometer at asteroids 2678 Steins and 21 Lutetia during the cruise phase of Rosetta, as well as preliminary maps obtained at comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in the Mapping phase carried out since August 2014. Furthermore, I will show temperature maps of asteroid Vesta obtained by the VIR mapping spectrometer onboard Dawn in 2011-2012, as well as very preliminary thermal data obtained at the dwarf planet Ceres in the early Approach phase.