Influence of the asymmetrical cratering rate on the lunar cratering chronology     

Tomokatsu Morota  Takashi Ukai  Muneyoshi Furumoto 《Icarus》2005,173(2):322-324

The lunar cratering rate studied over the past 1.1 Gyr, which is a foundation of the lunar cratering chronology, is a decreasing function of the angular distance from the apex of the orbital motion due to the synchronous rotation of the Moon. We here evaluate an influence of the asymmetrical rate upon the age determination.  相似文献   

Lunar photometric properties at wavelengths 0.5-1.6 μm acquired by SELENE Spectral Profiler and their dependency on local albedo and latitudinal zones     

Yasuhiro Yokota  Tsuneo Matsunaga  Junichi Haruyama  Satoru Yamamoto  Tomokatsu Morota  Kazuto Saiki  Kohei Kitazato  Akira Iwasaki  Naru Hirata  Rie Honda  Hitoshi Mizutani 《Icarus》2011,215(2):639-660

The lunar photometric function, which describes the dependency of the observed radiance on the observation geometry, is used for photometric correction of lunar visible/near-infrared data. A precise photometric correction parameter set is crucial for many applications including mineral identification and reflectance map mosaics. We present, for the first time, spectrally continuous photometric correction parameters for both sides of the Moon for wavelengths in the range 0.5-1.6 μm and solar phase angles between 5° and 85°, derived from Kaguya (SELENE) Spectral Profiler (SP) data. Since the measured radiance also depends on the surface albedo, we developed a statistical method for selecting areas with relatively uniform albedos from a nearly 7000-orbit SP data set. Using the selected data set, we obtained empirical photometric correction parameter sets for three albedo groups (high, medium, and low). We did this because the photometric function depends on the albedo, especially at phase angles below about 20° for which the shadow hiding opposition effect is appreciable. We determined the parameters in 160 bands and discovered a small variation in the opposition effect due to the albedo variation of mafic mineral absorption. The consistency of the photometric correction was checked by comparing observations made at different times of the same area on the lunar surface. Variations in the spectra obtained were lower than 2%, except for the large phase angle data in mare. Lastly, we developed a correction method for low solar elevation data, which is required for high latitude regions. By investigating low solar elevation data, we introduced an additional correction method. We used the new photometric correction to generate a 1° mesh global lunar reflectance map cube in a wavelength range of 0.5-1.6 μm. Surprisingly, these maps reveal that high latitude (?75°) regions in both the north and south have much lower spectral continuum slopes (color ratio r_1547.7nm/r_752.8nm ? 1.8) than the low and medium latitude regions, which implies lower degrees of space weathering.  相似文献   

Sublimation’s impact on temporal change of albedo dichotomy on Iapetus     

Jun Kimura  Taichi Kawamura  Tomokatsu Morota  Kiyoshi Kuramoto  Tatsuaki Okada 《Icarus》2011,214(2):596-605

Iapetus, one of the saturnian moons, has an extreme albedo contrast between the leading and trailing hemispheres. The origin of this albedo dichotomy has led to several hypotheses, however it remains controversial. To clarify the origin of the dichotomy, the key approach is to investigate the detailed distribution of the dark material. Recent studies of impact craters and surface temperature from Cassini spacecraft data implied that sublimation of H₂O ice can occur on Iapetus’ surface. This ice sublimation can change the albedo distribution on the moon with time.In this study, we evaluate the effect of ice sublimation and simulate the temporal change of surface albedo. We assume the dark material and the bright ice on the surface to be uniformly mixed with a certain volume fraction, and the initial albedo distribution to incorporate the dark material deposits on the surface. That is, the albedo at the apex is lowest and concentrically increases in a sinusoidal pattern. This situation simulates that dark materials existed around the Iapetus’ orbit billions of years ago, and the synchronously rotating Iapetus swept the material and then deposited it on its surface. The evolution of the surface albedo during 4.0 Gyr is simulated by estimating the surface temperature from the insolation energy on Iapetus including the effect of Saturn’s eccentricity and Iapetus’ obliquity precession, and evaluating the sublimation rate of H₂O ice from the Iapetus’ surface.As a result, we found that the distribution of the surface albedo changed dramatically after 4.0 Gyr of evolution. The sublimation has three important effects on the resultant surface albedo. First, the albedo in the leading hemisphere has significantly decreased to approach the minimum value. Second, the albedo distribution has been elongated along the equator. Third, the edge of the low albedo region has become clear. Considering the effect of ice sublimation, the current albedo distribution can be reconstructed from the sinusoidal albedo distribution, suggesting the apex-antapex cratering asymmetry as a candidate for the origin of the albedo dichotomy. From the model analysis, we obtained an important aspect that the depth of the turn-over layer where the darkening process proceeded for 4 Gyr should be an order of 10 cm, which is consistent with evaluation from the Cassini radar observations.  相似文献   

Magma source transition of lunar mare volcanism at 2.3 Ga          下载免费PDF全文

Shinsuke Kato  Tomokatsu Morota  Yasushi Yamaguchi  Sei‐ichiro Watanabe  Hisashi Otake  Makiko Ohtake 《Meteoritics & planetary science》2017,52(9):1899-1915

Mare basalts provide insights into the composition and thermal history of the lunar mantle. The ages of mare basalts suggest a first peak of magma activity at 3.2–3.8 Ga and a second peak at ~2 Ga. In this study, we reassess the correlation between the titanium contents and the eruption ages of mare basalt units using the compositional and chronological data updated by SELENE (Kaguya). Using morphological and geological criteria, we calculated the titanium content of 261 mare units across a representative area of each mare unit. In the Procellarum KREEP Terrane, where the latest eruptions are located, an increase in the mean titanium content is observed during the Eratosthenian period, as reported by previous studies. We found that the increase in the mean titanium content occurred within a relatively short period near approximately 2.3 Ga, suggesting that the magma source of the mare basalts changed at this particular age. Moreover, the high‐titanium basaltic eruptions are correlated with a second peak in volcanic activity near ~2 Ga. The high‐titanium basaltic eruptions occurring during the last volcanic activity period can be explained by the three possible scenarios (1) the ilmenite‐bearing cumulate rich layer in the core‐mantle boundary formed after the mantle overturn, (2) the basaltic material layers beneath the lunar crust formed through upwelling magmas, and (3) ilmenite‐bearing cumulate blocks remained in the upper mantle after the mantle overturn.  相似文献   

Olivine-rich exposures in the South Pole-Aitken Basin     

Satoru Yamamoto  Ryosuke Nakamura  Tsuneo Matsunaga  Yoshiko Ogawa  Yoshiaki Ishihara  Tomokatsu Morota  Naru Hirata  Makiko Ohtake  Takahiro Hiroi  Yasuhiro Yokota  Junichi Haruyama 《Icarus》2012,218(1):331-344

The distribution and the geological context of the olivine-rich exposures in the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) Basin on the Moon were investigated based on the spectral data obtained from the Spectral Profiler (SP) and Multiband Imager (MI) onboard the Japanese lunar explorer Kaguya/SELENE. The olivine-rich exposures are found only in the peak rings or central peaks of the Schrödinger basin and Zeeman crater, which are located in the outer region of the SPA Basin and not in the center region. On a localized scale, the olivine-rich materials are exposed on landslide features on the crater walls or sloped wall of the central peaks or the peak rings. Another observational finding is the co-existence of olivine-rich and plagioclase-rich materials on a kilometer scale spanning most of the olivine-rich sites in the Schrödinger basin. Pyroxene-rich materials are found in fresh craters outside the peak rings or the central peaks with olivine-rich materials. Based on these results, the following scenario are proposed: (1) the impact to form the SPA Basin melted a large amount of the lunar upper mantle and crust, and distributed the melted materials to the outer region; (2) local differentiation of melted materials hid the olivine-rich materials in the center region of the SPA Basin; (3) later impacts that formed the Schrödinger and Zeeman craters excavated and exposed the olivine-rich materials to the surface again; and (4) space weathering and regolith gardening obscured the olivine-rich spectra at the exposure sites, but recent, small scale impacts or landslides on the sloped wall exposed fresh olivine-rich materials, allowing the identification of the olivine-rich exposures by spectral remote-sensing. This suggests that several, different scale events play an important role in forming the surface distributions of originally deep-seated materials on the Moon, as well as on other planetary bodies.  相似文献   

Formation age of the lunar crater Giordano Bruno     

Tomokatsu Morota  Junichi Haruyama  Hideaki Miyamoto  Chikatoshi Honda  Makiko Ohtake  Yasuhiro Yokota  Tsuneo Matsunaga  Naru Hirata  Hirohide Demura  Hiroshi Takeda  Yoshiko Ogawa  Jun Kimura 《Meteoritics & planetary science》2009,44(8):1115-1120

Abstract— Using the Terrain Camera onboard the Japanese lunar explorer, SELENE (Kaguya), we obtained new high‐resolution images of the 22‐kilometer‐diameter lunar crater Giordano Bruno. Based on crater size‐frequency measurements of small craters (<200 m in diameter) superposed on its continuous ejecta, the formation age of Giordano Bruno is estimated to be 1 to 10 Ma. This is constructive evidence against the crater's medieval age formation hypothesis.  相似文献