polar_vortices_planetary_atmos

Enclosed are the (Python) scripts used to plot Figures 1, 5, 6 and 9 in Mitchell et al. (2021) Polar vortices in planetary atmospheres.

planetary_polar_vortices_cross_section.py

Plots Figure 1. Data used for Venus were provided by Norihiko Sugimoto, and the relevant paper is Sugimoto et al. (2019) Impact of Data Assimilation on THermal Tides in the Case of Venus Express Wind Observation (https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL082700). Data used for Earth are from ERA5 (https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/cdsapp#!/dataset/reanalysis-era5-pressure-levels?tab=form) and for Mars fom OpenMARS (https://ordo.open.ac.uk/collections/OpenMARS_database/4278950/1). The data used to plot the polar vortices on Titan were provided to us by Jason Sharkey, and the relevant paper is Sharkey et al. (2021) Potential Vorticity Structure in Titan's Polar Vortices from Cassini CIRS Observations (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2020.114030).

planetary_polar_vortices_mars_map.py

Plots Figure 5. Data used are from the OpenMARS reanalysis (https://ordo.open.ac.uk/collections/OpenMARS_database/4278950/1).

planetary_polar_vortices_trappist_1e.py

Plots Figure 9. Data is taken from the HAB1 Unified Model experiment from Fauchez et al. (2020) TRAPPIST-1 Habitable Atmosphere Intercomparison (THAI): motivations and protocol version 1.0 (https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-707-2020).

PVmodule.py

Potential vorticity is calculated using the script PVmodule.py, along with other helpful functions.

analysis_functions.py

Various useful functions, including Lait-scaling for potential vorticity.

calculate_PV_venus.py

Calculates PV from AFES-Venus reanalysis data.

plot_titanvortex.gmt

GMT shell script to plot figure 6

plot_titanvortex.gmt main GMT plotting script

plot_titanvortex.poly mask for regions where observations exist

plot_titanvortex_HC3N.dat HC3N vmr data from Teanby et al 2019, GRL

plot_titanvortex_HC3N.dat.grd gridded version in GMT .grd format

plot_titanvortex_PV_0.1mbar.dat PV at 0.1mbar/0.1hPa from Sharkey et al 2021, Icarus

plot_titanvortex_PV_0.1mbar.dat.grd gridded version in GMT .grd format

plot_titanvortex_T_1mbar.dat Temperature at 1mbar/1hPa from Sharkey et al 2021, Icarus

plot_titanvortex_T_1mbar.dat.grd gridded version in GMT .grd format

plot_titanvortex_northvortex.txt Dashed line showing northern vortex edge

plot_titanvortex_southvortex.txt Dashed line showing southern vortex edge

plot_titanvortex_yls.labels Ls labels

plot_titanvortex_yls.ticks Ls ticks

References:

Data is extracted from the following two publications:

1. Sharkey J., Teanby N.A., Sylvestre M., Mitchell D.M., Seviour W.J.M., Nixon C.A., Irwin P.G.J., 2021, 'Potential vorticity structure of Titan's polar vortices from Cassini CIRS observations', Icarus, 354, 114030. doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2020.114030

Full dataset available at: https://data.mendeley.com/datasets/wn8j8f8ck7/1

2. Teanby N.A., Sylvestre M., Sharkey J., Nixon C.A., Vinatier S., Irwin P.G.J., 2019, 'Seasonal Evolution of Titan's Stratosphere During the Cassini Mission', Geophysical Research Letters, 46, 3079. doi:10.1029/2018GL081401

The paper is open access and the full datasets are available from the 'Supporting Information' at: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2018GL081401

Software:

GMT plotting software is freely available from:

https://www.generic-mapping-tools.org