Mars atmospheric water

We indicate the Dec. 3-4 spectrum averaged over the morning limb of Mars. Two synthetic spectra indicate the expected line emission for 3 precipitable microns of water with a uniform vertical distribution (dotted) and a vertical distribution in which water decreases rapidly above 20 km altitude if Mars atmospheric temperatures are approximately 20 K cooler than implied by the Viking Infrared Thermal Mapping (IRTM) and lander descent observations. Such cooler atmospheric temperatures have been argued on the basis of ground-based microwave observations of Mars atmospheric CO. Our 3 pr micron column abundance for water can be compared to the global value of approximately 6 pr microns, observation for the same season with the Viking MAWD experiment in 1977. We will investigate the latitude and diurnal variations when the data corresponding to the second day of observations are reduced. We also plan to compare these VLA water observations with a very complementary set of Hubble Space Telescope ozone observations. Ultraviolet (220-330 nm) spectra and imates of Mars were obtained on Dec. 13 1990 as part of a general Mars observing program with the Hubble Space Telescope.