Description
The JUpiter ICy moons Explorer (JUICE) mission from the European Space Agency (ESA), will make detailed observations to characterize Jupiter’s atmosphere that are complementary to those from Juno. In preparation for its arrival to the Jovian System in July 2031, the line-by-line Radiative Transfer (RT) code developed at the Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB), ASIMUT-ALVL, was upgraded to now allow the characterization of Jupiter’s atmosphere. The first step involved the comparison of the main spectroscopic features against KOPRA, a RT code already used for the study of Jupiter’s atmosphere, developed by the Astrophysics Institute of Andalusia (IAA). Later, ASIMUT-ALVL was used to reproduce observations performed by the Visible and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) onboard the Cassini mission during its flyby to Jupiter. Since the visible and near-infrared (VIS-NIR) spectrometry has a remarkable potential for characterizing the composition and dynamics of planetary atmospheres, this work is focused on the wavelength range between 0.5μm and 2.5μm, which is also covered by the VIS-NIR channel of the Moons And Jupiter Imaging Spectrometer (MAJIS), a hyperspectral camera on board JUICE. ASIMUT-ALVL is now available for the simulation of realistic observational scenarios to assess the impact of the capabilities of MAJIS on the characterization of abundances of different species present in the atmosphere, including aerosols, CH4 and NH3, being complementary to other RT models. Moreover, during this assessment, it was possible to optimize the spectral sampling of MAJIS, and provide valuable information for the planned data return of the instrument during science operations.
