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Published April 2018 | Published + Accepted Version
Journal Article Open

Moist adiabats with multiple condensing species: A new theory with application to giant planet atmospheres

Abstract

We derived a new formula for calculating the moist adiabatic temperature profile of an atmosphere consisting of ideal gases with multiple condensing species. This expression unifies various formulas published in the literature and can be generalized to account for chemical reactions. Unlike previous methods, it converges to machine precision independent of mesh size. It accounts for any ratio of condensable vapors to dry gas, from zero to infinity, and for variable heat capacities as a function of temperature. Because the derivation is generic, the new formula is not only applicable to planetary atmosphere in the solar system, but also to hot Jupiters and brown dwarfs in which a variety of alkali metals, silicates and exotic materials condense. We demonstrate that even though the vapors are ideal gases, they interact in their effects on the moist adiabatic lapse rate. Finally, we apply the new thermodynamic model to study the effects of downdrafts on the distribution of minor constituents and thermal profile in the Galileo probe hotspot. We find that the Galileo Probe measurements can be interpreted as a strong downdraft that displaces an air parcel from 1 bar to the 4 bar level.

Additional Information

© 2018 American Meteorological Society. Published Online: 26 January 2018. The research was carried out at Jet Propulsion Laboratory and California Institute of Technology. C.L. was supported by NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship and by an internship at JPL working with Michael Janssen on the preparation for the Juno mission. We thank Michael Janssen's support for the internship and his kind assistance for hosting C.L. at JPL.

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Published - jas-d-17-0257.1.pdf

Accepted Version - 1801.05529.pdf

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Additional details

Created:
August 19, 2023
Modified:
October 18, 2023