Solar‐Asynchronous Tides and Stationary Planetary Waves in Mars Thermosphere Derived From MAVEN Data

Abstract Measurements of Ar and densities in Mars' thermosphere between 160 and 250 km altitude from the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) Neutral Gas and Ion Mass Spectrometer (NGIMS) during February 2015–February 2023 are analyzed to derive solar‐asynchronous tides DE2, DE1, and SE1, and stationary planetary waves (SPWs) with zonal wavenumbers . Broad agreement between the MAVEN tides and SPWs and those derived from the Mars Climate Database (MCD) is attained insofar as the following conclusions are concerned: (a) DE2, DE1, and SE1 are the most prominent solar‐asynchronous tides in Mars' thermosphere; (b) The tidal latitudinal structures can be reconstructed by superposition of just a few thermospheric Hough Mode Extensions (HMEs) based on classical tidal theory and numerical computation; (c) The SPWs are as large in magnitude as the solar tides; (d) SPW1 arises due to DE2 DE1 and solar‐synchronous DW1 D0 nonlinear (NL) interactions; (e) SPW3 and SPW2 are produced as a result of DW1 DE2 and DE1 NL interactions, respectively; and (f) the Ar tide and SPW amplitudes are larger than those in . While the DE2 and DE1 amplitudes in the MCD increase monotonically with height up to 250 km, the MAVEN amplitudes decrease with height above 225 km. This disparity suggests differences in tidal dissipation and/or linkage with the fact that the exobase for lies between 225 and 250 km. However, the height structure of Ar is more like that in the MCD.