Vertical thermal structure of the Venus atmosphere from temperature and pressure measurements

Accurate temperature and pressure measurements were made on the Vega-2 lander during its entire descent. The temperature and pressure at the surface were 733 K and 89.3 bar, respectively. A strong temperature inversion was found in the upper troposphere. Several layers with differing static stability were visible in the atmospheric structure

Rotation of an oblate satellite: Chaos control

Aims. This paper investigates the chaotic rotation of an oblate satellite in the context of chaos control. Methods. A model of planar oscillations, described with the Beletskii equation, was investigated. The Hamiltonian formalism was utilized to employ a control method for suppressing chaos. Results. An additive control term, which is an order of magnitude smaller than the potential, is constructed. This allows not only for significantly diminished diffusion of the trajectory in the phase space, but turns the purely chaotic motion into strictly periodic motion.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures; accepted in A&

Nonlinear time-series analysis of Hyperion's lightcurves

Hyperion is a satellite of Saturn that was predicted to remain in a chaotic rotational state. This was confirmed to some extent by Voyager 2 and Cassini series of images and some ground-based photometric observations. The aim of this aticle is to explore conditions for potential observations to meet in order to estimate a maximal Lyapunov Exponent (mLE), which being positive is an indicator of chaos and allows to characterise it quantitatively. Lightcurves existing in literature as well as numerical simulations are examined using standard tools of theory of chaos. It is found that existing datasets are too short and undersampled to detect a positive mLE, although its presence is not rejected. Analysis of simulated lightcurves leads to an assertion that observations from one site should be performed over a year-long period to detect a positive mLE, if present, in a reliable way. Another approach would be to use 2---3 telescopes spread over the world to have observations distributed more uniformly. This may be achieved without disrupting other observational projects being conducted. The necessity of time-series to be stationary is highly stressed.Comment: 34 pages, 12 figures, 4 tables; v2 after referee report; matches the version accepted in Astrophysics and Space Scienc

The astrometric Gaia-FUN-SSO observation campaign of 99 942 Apophis

Astrometric observations performed by the Gaia Follow-Up Network for Solar System Objects (Gaia-FUN-SSO) play a key role in ensuring that moving objects first detected by ESA's Gaia mission remain recoverable after their discovery. An observation campaign on the potentially hazardous asteroid (99 942) Apophis was conducted during the asteroid's latest period of visibility, from 12/21/2012 to 5/2/2013, to test the coordination and evaluate the overall performance of the Gaia-FUN-SSO . The 2732 high quality astrometric observations acquired during the Gaia-FUN-SSO campaign were reduced with the Platform for Reduction of Astronomical Images Automatically (PRAIA), using the USNO CCD Astrograph Catalogue 4 (UCAC4) as a reference. The astrometric reduction process and the precision of the newly obtained measurements are discussed. We compare the residuals of astrometric observations that we obtained using this reduction process to data sets that were individually reduced by observers and accepted by the Minor Planet Center. We obtained 2103 previously unpublished astrometric positions and provide these to the scientific community. Using these data we show that our reduction of this astrometric campaign with a reliable stellar catalog substantially improves the quality of the astrometric results. We present evidence that the new data will help to reduce the orbit uncertainty of Apophis during its close approach in 2029. We show that uncertainties due to geolocations of observing stations, as well as rounding of astrometric data can introduce an unnecessary degradation in the quality of the resulting astrometric positions. Finally, we discuss the impact of our campaign reduction on the recovery process of newly discovered asteroids.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&

The choice of spectrum of LED irradiators affect the life of lighting systems in horticulture

The article presents the results of experimental studies of LED degradation in greenhouse irradiators for horticulture. It was found that in the process of operation of the irradiators the emission spectrum changes. This is caused by different decrease rate of photosynthetic photon flux of different colored LEDs. For a longer service life it is recommended to use greenhouse irradiators with a large proportion of red LEDs