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arXiv · 2112.07764

Pluto's atmosphere in plateau phase since 2015 from a stellar occultation at Devasthal

Bruno Sicardy·Nagarhalli M. Ashok·Anandmayee Tej·Ganesh Pawar·Shishir Deshmukh·Ameya Deshpande·Saurabh Sharma·Josselin Desmars·Marcelo Assafin·Jose Luis Ortiz·Gustavo Benedetti-Rossi·Felipe Braga-Ribas·Roberto Vieira-Martins·Pablo Santos-Sanz·Krishan Chand·Bhuwan C. Bhatt
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Abstract

A stellar occultation by Pluto was observed on 6 June 2020 with the 1.3-m and 3.6-m telescopes located at Devasthal, Nainital, India, using imaging systems in the I and H bands, respectively. From this event, we derive a surface pressure for Pluto's atmosphere of $p_{\rm surf}= 12.23^{+0.65}_{-0.38} $~$\mu$bar. This shows that Pluto's atmosphere is in a plateau phase since mid-2015, a result which is in excellent agreement with the Pluto volatile transport model of Meza et al. (2019}. This value does not support the pressure decrease reported by independent teams, based on occultations observed in 2018 and 2019, see Young et al. (2021} and Arimatu et al. (2020), respectively.

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Bruno Sicardy, Nagarhalli M. Ashok, Anandmayee Tej, Ganesh Pawar, Shishir Deshmukh, Ameya Deshpande, Saurabh Sharma, Josselin Desmars, Marcelo Assafin, Jose Luis Ortiz, Gustavo Benedetti-Rossi, Felipe Braga-Ribas, Roberto Vieira-Martins, Pablo Santos-Sanz, Krishan Chand, Bhuwan C. Bhatt. 2021-12-14. Pluto's atmosphere in plateau phase since 2015 from a stellar occultation at Devasthal. https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213%2Fac4249

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