CaltechAUTHORS
Published January 23, 2015 | Version Supplemental Material
Journal Article Open

Mars methane detection and variability at Gale crater

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon Jet Propulsion Lab
  • 2. ROR icon Goddard Space Flight Center
  • 3. ROR icon University of Michigan–Ann Arbor
  • 4. ROR icon Research Institute in Astrophysics and Planetology
  • 5. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 6. ROR icon Andalusian Earth Sciences Institute
  • 7. ROR icon Luleå University of Technology
  • 8. ROR icon Centro de Astrobiología
  • 9. ROR icon University of Maryland, College Park
  • 10. ROR icon University of Hawaii at Manoa
  • 11. ROR icon Carnegie Institution for Science
  • 12. ROR icon Johnson Space Center
  • 13. ROR icon Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques
  • 14. ROR icon Ames Research Center
  • 15. ROR icon York University
  • 16. ROR icon The Open University
  • 17. ROR icon University of Leicester
  • 18. ROR icon National Autonomous University of Mexico
  • 19. ROR icon University of Guelph
  • 20. ROR icon Texas A&M University

Abstract

Reports of plumes or patches of methane in the Martian atmosphere that vary over monthly timescales have defied explanation to date. From in situ measurements made over a 20-month period by the Tunable Laser Spectrometer (TLS) of the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument suite on Curiosity at Gale Crater, we report detection of background levels of atmospheric methane of mean value 0.69 ± 0.25 ppbv at the 95% confidence interval (CI). This abundance is lower than model estimates of ultraviolet (UV) degradation of accreted interplanetary dust particles (IDP's) or carbonaceous chondrite material. Additionally, in four sequential measurements spanning a 60-sol period, we observed elevated levels of methane of 7.2 ± 2.1 (95% CI) ppbv implying that Mars is episodically producing methane from an additional unknown source.

Additional Information

Copyright 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science. Received for publication 24 September 2014. Accepted for publication 5 December 2014. Published Online [Science Express] December 16 2014. The research described here was carried out in part at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Cal1forn1a Institute of Technology. under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Data described 1n the paper are further described 1n the Supplementary Materials and have been submitted to NASA's Planetary Data System (PDS) under an arrangement with the Mars Science Laboratory project. Funding is acknowledged for JMT and MPZ from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Compet1veness, JCB from the United Kingdom Space Agency. and RG from the Canadian Space Agency.

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Supplemental Material - Webster.SM.pdf

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Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
52526
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20141210-083300697

Related works

Describes
http://pds-geosciences.wustl.edu/missions/msl/index.htm (URL)

Funding

NASA
Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad (MINECO)
United Kingdom Space Agency (UKSA)
Canadian Space Agency (CSA)

Dates

Created
2014-12-16
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-10
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS)