Examination of volcanism and impact cratering on terrestrial bodies

Thesis (Ph.D.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2023Exploring and expanding our understanding of the planets (i.e., planetary science) encompasses a vast array of topics and disciplines. This dissertation concentrates on the surficial processes of and examination of terrestrial planets, primarily via the study of volcanism and impact cratering. The first project starts with an exploration of NIR remote sensing techniques as applied to Venus. This work found that NIR remote sensing at the clement conditions just beneath the cloud deck provide vastly improved imaging capability. This improved visibility is most notable for the tesserae, regions of Venus of great interest to the scientific community. Radar imagery and derived data products were then used to survey 21 mid-sized volcanoes on the surface of Venus. Similar to volcanoes at larger diameters, the midsized volcanoes of Venus are significantly flatter than those on other terrestrial bodies. Several of these volcanoes also show deformation that requires a negligibly thin lithosphere some time after the emplacement of the construct. The third project then evaluates the hazards involved with safely placing a lander on the Venusian tesserae and examines potential methods by which to detect and then avoid these hazards. Safely placing a suite of scientific instruments on tesserae is necessary to answer long-standing questions about Venus. Current technologies put relevant hazards at the edge of detection (i.e., zero fault tolerance) and can execute divert maneuvers of only a few tens of meters. Investment in hazard detection and avoidance technologies is necessary to bring safety margins to acceptable levels; data from future missions - while helpful - will be insufficient to select safe landing zones prior to launch. Oblique impact cratering is a ubiquitous event (approximately half of all impacts are at 45 or less). Our poor understanding of this process leaves a significant amount of information buried and waiting to be uncovered. Low-velocity oblique impact experiments were conducted at John's Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory Planetary Impact Lab to better understand the oblique impact process and prepare for high velocity experiments at similar impact angles. These experiments also sought to understand the effect of target tilt, which is currently necessary at existing experimental facilities in order to simulate changes in impact angle smaller than 15°. These experiments show that target tilt significantly amplifies oblique characteristics (e.g., aspect ratio, butterfly ejecta). The time-delayed and spatially offset transference of energy from the impactor to the target is important in determining the excavation process and final crater morphology and ejecta distribution

Políticas de Copyright de Publicações Científicas em Repositórios Institucionais: O Caso do INESC TEC

A progressiva transformação das práticas científicas, impulsionada pelo desenvolvimento das novas Tecnologias de Informação e Comunicação (TIC), têm possibilitado aumentar o acesso à informação, caminhando gradualmente para uma abertura do ciclo de pesquisa. Isto permitirá resolver a longo prazo uma adversidade que se tem colocado aos investigadores, que passa pela existência de barreiras que limitam as condições de acesso, sejam estas geográficas ou financeiras. Apesar da produção científica ser dominada, maioritariamente, por grandes editoras comerciais, estando sujeita às regras por estas impostas, o Movimento do Acesso Aberto cuja primeira declaração pública, a Declaração de Budapeste (BOAI), é de 2002, vem propor alterações significativas que beneficiam os autores e os leitores. Este Movimento vem a ganhar importância em Portugal desde 2003, com a constituição do primeiro repositório institucional a nível nacional. Os repositórios institucionais surgiram como uma ferramenta de divulgação da produção científica de uma instituição, com o intuito de permitir abrir aos resultados da investigação, quer antes da publicação e do próprio processo de arbitragem (preprint), quer depois (postprint), e, consequentemente, aumentar a visibilidade do trabalho desenvolvido por um investigador e a respetiva instituição. O estudo apresentado, que passou por uma análise das políticas de copyright das publicações científicas mais relevantes do INESC TEC, permitiu não só perceber que as editoras adotam cada vez mais políticas que possibilitam o auto-arquivo das publicações em repositórios institucionais, como também que existe todo um trabalho de sensibilização a percorrer, não só para os investigadores, como para a instituição e toda a sociedade. A produção de um conjunto de recomendações, que passam pela implementação de uma política institucional que incentive o auto-arquivo das publicações desenvolvidas no âmbito institucional no repositório, serve como mote para uma maior valorização da produção científica do INESC TEC.The progressive transformation of scientific practices, driven by the development of new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), which made it possible to increase access to information, gradually moving towards an opening of the research cycle. This opening makes it possible to resolve, in the long term, the adversity that has been placed on researchers, which involves the existence of barriers that limit access conditions, whether geographical or financial. Although large commercial publishers predominantly dominate scientific production and subject it to the rules imposed by them, the Open Access movement whose first public declaration, the Budapest Declaration (BOAI), was in 2002, proposes significant changes that benefit the authors and the readers. This Movement has gained importance in Portugal since 2003, with the constitution of the first institutional repository at the national level. Institutional repositories have emerged as a tool for disseminating the scientific production of an institution to open the results of the research, both before publication and the preprint process and postprint, increase the visibility of work done by an investigator and his or her institution. The present study, which underwent an analysis of the copyright policies of INESC TEC most relevant scientific publications, allowed not only to realize that publishers are increasingly adopting policies that make it possible to self-archive publications in institutional repositories, all the work of raising awareness, not only for researchers but also for the institution and the whole society. The production of a set of recommendations, which go through the implementation of an institutional policy that encourages the self-archiving of the publications developed in the institutional scope in the repository, serves as a motto for a greater appreciation of the scientific production of INESC TEC