Rotational Variability of Earth's Polar Regions: Implications for Detecting Snowball Planets

TL;DR

This study presents the first time-resolved polar observations of Earth, analyzes surface features using PCA, and models snowball planets to understand how their spectral signatures differ from modern Earth, aiding exoplanet characterization.

Contribution

It provides new polar observational data of Earth, applies PCA to characterize surface inhomogeneities, and models snowball planets to identify spectral differences from modern Earth.

Findings

Polar observations show higher albedo and cloudiness sensitivity.

PCA reveals dominant cloud-related spectral features.

Snowball Earth exhibits distinct color variations and higher albedo.

Abstract

We have obtained the first time-resolved, disc-integrated observations of Earth's poles with the Deep Impact spacecraft as part of the EPOXI Mission of Opportunity. These data mimic what we will see when we point next-generation space telescopes at nearby exoplanets. We use principal component analysis (PCA) and rotational lightcurve inversion to characterize color inhomogeneities and map their spatial distribution from these unusual vantage points, as a complement to the equatorial views presented in Cowan et al. (2009). We also perform the same PCA on a suite of simulated rotational multi-band lightcurves from NASA's Virtual Planetary Laboratory 3D spectral Earth model. This numerical experiment allows us to understand what sorts of surface features PCA can robustly identify. We find that the EPOXI polar observations have similar broadband colors as the equatorial Earth, but with 20-30% greater apparent albedo. This is because the polar observations are most sensitive to mid-latitudes, which tend to be more cloudy than the equatorial latitudes emphasized by the original EPOXI Earth observations. The cloudiness of the mid-latitudes also manifests itself in the form of increased variability at short wavelengths in the polar observations, and as a dominant gray eigencolor in the south polar observation. We construct a simple reflectance model for a snowball Earth. By construction, our model has a higher Bond albedo than the modern Earth; its surface albedo is so high that Rayleigh scattering does not noticeably affect its spectrum. The rotational color variations occur at short wavelengths due to the large contrast between glacier ice and bare land in those wavebands. Thus we find that both the broadband colors and diurnal color variations of such a planet would be easily distinguishable from the modern-day Earth, regardless of viewing angle.