Matching Items (3)
Filtering by
- Genre: Masters Thesis
- Status: Published
Description
The pace of exoplanet discoveries has rapidly accelerated in the past few decades and the number of planets with measured mass and radius is expected to pick up in the coming years. Many more planets with a size similar to earth are expected to be found. Currently, software for characterizing rocky planet interiors is lacking. There is no doubt that a planet’s interior plays a key role in determining surface conditions including atmosphere composition and land area. Comparing data with diagrams of mass vs. radius for terrestrial planets provides only a first-order estimate of the internal structure and composition of planets [e.g. Seager et al 2007]. This thesis will present a new Python library, ExoPlex, which has routines to create a forward model of rocky exoplanets between 0.1 and 5 Earth masses. The ExoPlex code offers users the ability to model planets of arbitrary composition of Fe-Si-Mg-Al-Ca-O in addition to a water layer. This is achieved by modeling rocky planets after the earth and other known terrestrial planets. The three distinct layers which make up the Earth's internal structure are: core, mantle, and water. Terrestrial planet cores will be dominated by iron however, like earth, there may be some quantity of light element inclusion which can serve to enhance expected core volumes. In ExoPlex, these light element inclusions are S-Si-O and are included as iron-alloys. Mantles will have a more diverse mineralogy than planet cores. Unlike most other rocky planet models, ExoPlex remains unbiased in its treatment of the mantle in terms of composition. Si-Mg-Al-Ca oxide components are combined by predicting the mantle mineralogy using a Gibbs free energy minimization software package called Perple\_X [Connolly 2009]. By allowing an arbitrary composition, ExoPlex can uniquely model planets using their host star’s composition as an indicator of planet composition. This is a proven technique [Dorn et al 2015] which has not yet been widely utilized, possibly due to the lack of availability of easy to use software. I present a model sensitivity analysis to indicate the most important parameters to constrain in future observing missions. ExoPlex is currently available on PyPI so it may be installed using pip or conda on Mac OS or Linux based operating systems. It requires a specific scripting environment which is explained in the documentation currently stored on the ExoPlex GitHub page.
ContributorsLorenzo, Alejandro M., Jr (Author) / Desch, Steven (Thesis advisor) / Shim, Dan S.-H. (Committee member) / Line, Michael (Committee member) / Li, Mingming (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
The Kuiper Belt Object Haumea is one of the most fascinating objects in the solar system. Spectral reflectance observations reveal a surface of almost pure water ice, yet it has a mass of 4.006 × 1021 kg, measured from orbits of its moons, along with an inferred mean radius of 715 km, and these imply a mean density of around 2600 kg m−3. Thus the surface ice must be a veneer over a rocky core. This model is supported by observations of Haumea's light curve, which shows large photometric variations over an anomalously rapid 3.9154-hour rotational period. Haumea's surface composition is uniform, therefore the light curve must be due to a varying area presented to the observer, implying that Haumea has an oblong, ellipsoidal shape. If Haumea's rotation axis is normal to our line of sight, and Haumea reflects with a lunar-like scattering function, then its axis ratios are p = b/a = 0.80 (in the equatorial cross section) and q = c/a = 0.52 (in the polar cross section). In this work, I assume that Haumea is in hydrostatic equilibrium, and I model it as a two-phase ellipsoid with an ice mantle and a rocky core. I model the core assuming it has a given density in the range between 2700–3300 kg m−3 with axis ratios that are free to vary. The metric which my code uses calculates the angle between the gravity vector and the surface normal, then averages this over both the outer surface and the core-mantle boundary. When this fit angle is minimized, it allows an interpretation of the size and shape of the core, as well as the thickness of the ice mantle. Results of my calculations show that Haumea's most likely core density is 2700–2800 kg m−3, with ice thicknesses anywhere from 12–32 km over the poles and as thin as 4–18 km over the equator.
ContributorsProbst, Luke (Author) / Desch, Steven (Thesis advisor) / Asphaug, Erik (Committee member) / Bell, James (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
With the InSight mission deploying a seismometer , Martian bulk chemical compositional models are more important than ever. Three largely consistent models for the Martian mantle have been suggested over the past two decades. Of these three, two are fairly similar and one is dramatically different. Of these three, the EH70 (Sanloup et al., 1999) models have the systematically lower divalent cation to silicon ratios as compared to the other model, the DW85 (Dreibus and Wanke, 1985) model. However, impact of such a low (Mg+Fe+Ca)/Si ratio on mineralogy has not been experimentally investigated. Measurements have been made of the mineralogy of the EH70 bulk mantle composition (Sanloup et al., 1999)) through in-situ laser-heated diamond anvil cell (LHDAC) and large volume press (LVP). Majorite-garnet (Mj) dominated mineralogy has been observed up to 25 GPa. Bridgmanite (Bm) begins to appear from 25.2 GPa and continues in a mixed phase with Mj up to 27 GPa at which point only Bm and calcium perovskite (CaPv) remain. Akimotoite (Ak) is stable up to 1873 K, higher by ≈300 K compared to numerical calculations (Connolly, 2009). This may result in an Ak layer in the Martian mantle, something missing in Earth’s mantle. The overall ratio of pyroxene to olivine polymorphs by volume is high, approaching pure pyroxene. This agrees with numerical calculations. Additionally, ferropericlase (Fp) is stable at lower temperatures, suggesting a higher dependence on temperature for its stability, something that is different from Perple_X calculations which show a strong dependence on pressure. Furthermore, Mj, which make up a majority of the volume of EH70 mantles, was measured to increase in Fe content as pressure increases. The more oxidizing conditions coupled with the silicon-rich composition resulted in three times higher Fe3+ content in Mj as opposed to a pyrolite model. This increased Fe3+ meant our Mj composition approached that of skiagite (Ski,Fe2+ 3 Fe3+ 2 Si3O12) and this caused Mj to have a very low compressibility of only 152.8 GPa, lower than any other Mj compositions in literature. This result suggests that a mantle with EH70 bulk composition would have lower than predicted seismic wave velocities , lower than Perple_X predicts. The Al content of Mj was also found to suppress the first derivative of compressibility to 4.45, lower than that of Ski100 at 6.7. Such differences compared with pyrolitic composition are important to estimate the velocity profiles and to model the dynamics of the Martian mantle. This dataset of mineralogy and composition can also model terrestrial exoplanetary mantles. Current measurements of stellar abundances show a wide range of compositions, and especially compositions with (Mg+Fe+Ca)/Si ratios approaching 1 (Brewer and Fischer, 2016). This experimental study of EH70 composition can fill-in this gap.
ContributorsDolinschi, Jonathan David (Author) / Shim, Sang-Heon D. (Thesis advisor) / Desch, Steven (Committee member) / Lee, Mingming (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019