A belt-like distribution of gaseous hydrogen cyanide on Neptune's equatorial stratosphere detected by ALMA

TL;DR

This study provides a high-resolution map of hydrogen cyanide distribution on Neptune, revealing a band-like equatorial enhancement that informs atmospheric circulation and external supply hypotheses.

Contribution

First spatially resolved map of Neptune's HCN distribution, showing equatorial enhancement and insights into atmospheric circulation or external sources.

Findings

HCN abundance is 40% higher at the equator than at southern latitudes.

Detected a band-like HCN enhancement at Neptune's equator.

Harmonizes HCN distribution with meridional circulation models.

Abstract

We present a spatially resolved map of integrated-intensity and abundance of Neptune's stratospheric hydrogen cyanide (HCN). The analyzed data were obtained from the archived 2016 observation of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. A 0.42 $\times$ 0.39 arcseconds synthesized beam, which is equivalent to a latitudinal resolution of $\sim$20 degrees at the disk center, was fine enough to resolve Neptune's 2.24 arcseconds diameter disk. After correcting the effect of different optical path lengths, a spatial distribution of HCN emissions is derived over Neptune's disk, and it clearly shows a band-like HCN enhancement at the equator. Radiative transfer analysis indicates that the HCN volume mixing ratio measured at the equator was 1.92 ppb above the 10$^{-3}$ bar pressure level, which is 40$\%$ higher than that measured at the southern middle and high latitudes. The spatial distribution of HCN can be interpreted as either the effect of the transportation of N$_{2}$ from the troposphere by meridional atmospheric circulation, or an external supply such as cometary collisions (or both of these reasons). From the meridional circulation point of view, the observed HCN enhancement on both the equator and the pole can be explained by the production and accumulation of HCN at the downward branches of the previously suggested two-cell meridional circulation models. However, the HCN-depleted latitude of 60 S does not match with the location of the upward branch of the two-cell circulation models.