Auroral and Non‐Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck‐NIRSPEC and IRTF‐iSHELL

Emma Thomas; Tom Stallard; Henrik Melin; M. Nahid Chowdhury; Luke Moore; James O'Donoghue; Rosie E. Johnson; Ruoyan Wang; Katie Knowles; Paola Tiranti; N. Dello Russo; Ronald J. Vervack; Hideyo Kawakita

doi:10.1029/2024GL112001

Auroral and Non‐Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck‐NIRSPEC and IRTF‐iSHELL

Emma Thomas^*, Tom Stallard, Henrik Melin, M. Nahid Chowdhury, Luke Moore, James O'Donoghue, Rosie E. Johnson, Ruoyan Wang, Katie Knowles, Paola Tiranti, N. Dello Russo, Ronald J. Vervack, Hideyo Kawakita

^*Corresponding author for this work

Mathematics, Physics and Electrical Engineering

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere‐ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H3+ emission lines were used to derive dawn‐to‐dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H3+ column densities up to 6.0 × 1016 m−2. While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 14%–20% super rotation across the planet's disk in 2014 and a 7%–18% super rotation in 2016.

Original language	English
Article number	e2024GL112001
Number of pages	9
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Volume	52
Issue number	7
Early online date	1 Apr 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GL112001
Publication status	Published - 16 Apr 2025

Keywords

H3+
Uranus
ground‐based astronomy
ice giant ionosphere
infrared aurorae
infrared spectrscopy
H
ground-based astronomy

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Geophysical Research Letters - 2025 - Thomas - Auroral and Non‐Auroral H3 Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck‐NIRSPEC andFinal published version, 1.18 MBLicence: CC BY

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Thomas, E., Stallard, T., Melin, H., Chowdhury, M. N., Moore, L., O'Donoghue, J., Johnson, R. E., Wang, R., Knowles, K., Tiranti, P., Dello Russo, N., Vervack, R. J., & Kawakita, H. (2025). Auroral and Non‐Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck‐NIRSPEC and IRTF‐iSHELL. Geophysical Research Letters, 52(7), Article e2024GL112001. https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GL112001

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abstract = "To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere‐ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H3+ emission lines were used to derive dawn‐to‐dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H3+ column densities up to 6.0 × 1016 m−2. While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 14%–20% super rotation across the planet's disk in 2014 and a 7%–18% super rotation in 2016.",

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author = "Emma Thomas and Tom Stallard and Henrik Melin and Chowdhury, {M. Nahid} and Luke Moore and James O'Donoghue and Johnson, {Rosie E.} and Ruoyan Wang and Katie Knowles and Paola Tiranti and {Dello Russo}, N. and Vervack, {Ronald J.} and Hideyo Kawakita",

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AU - Thomas, Emma

AU - Stallard, Tom

AU - Melin, Henrik

AU - Chowdhury, M. Nahid

AU - Moore, Luke

AU - O'Donoghue, James

AU - Johnson, Rosie E.

AU - Wang, Ruoyan

AU - Knowles, Katie

AU - Tiranti, Paola

AU - Dello Russo, N.

AU - Vervack, Ronald J.

AU - Kawakita, Hideyo

PY - 2025/4/16

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N2 - To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere‐ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H3+ emission lines were used to derive dawn‐to‐dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H3+ column densities up to 6.0 × 1016 m−2. While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 14%–20% super rotation across the planet's disk in 2014 and a 7%–18% super rotation in 2016.

AB - To date, no investigation has documented ionospheric flows at Uranus. Previous investigations of Jupiter and Saturn have demonstrated that mapping ion winds can be used to understand ionospheric currents and how these connect to magnetosphere‐ionosphere coupling. We present a study of Uranus's near infrared emissions (NIR) using data from the Keck II Telescope's Near InfraRed SPECtrograph (NIRSPEC) and the InfraRed Telescope Facility's iSHELL spectrograph. H3+ emission lines were used to derive dawn‐to‐dusk intensity, ionospheric temperatures and ion densities to identify auroral emissions, with their Doppler shifts used to measure ion velocities. We confirm the presence of the southern NIR aurora in 2016, driven by elevated H3+ column densities up to 6.0 × 1016 m−2. While no auroral emissions were detected in 2014, we find a 14%–20% super rotation across the planet's disk in 2014 and a 7%–18% super rotation in 2016.

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Auroral and Non‐Auroral H3+ Ion Winds at Uranus With Keck‐NIRSPEC and IRTF‐iSHELL

Abstract

Keywords

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