The Dissipation Regime of Turbulence on Mars Observed With Microphone Data From the Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover
Abstract Turbulent winds are a regular occurrence in planetary boundary layers. Turbulence affects mixing, energy fluxes and forcing on the surface environment. Energy injected into an atmosphere generates eddies of many scales down to a size where molecular viscous forces dominate, termed the Kolmogorov length scale. Here, we present an analysis of the turbulent energy cascade at this scale, the transition between the inertial and dissipative regimes, for the first time on Mars. This analysis is based on data from the SuperCam microphone on the Perseverance mission. We find a distribution of power laws in the inertial regime predominantly between −3 and −1 and the distribution of the Kolmogorov length scale from 0.005 to 0.03 m. This yields estimates of the dissipation rate of turbulence between 0.0001 and 1 . We compare these values to those calculated using Monin‐Obukhov similarity theory, identifying potential shortcomings for its application on Mars without modification.
Authors
- Tanguy Bertrand (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2302-9776)
- Alexander Stott (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6121-705X)
- Claire Newman (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9990-8817)
- Martin Gillier (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0127-1617)
- Manuel de la Torre Juárez (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1393-5297)
- R. Hueso (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0169-123X)
- Baptiste Chide (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5124-9119)
- R. D. Lorenz (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8528-4644)
- D. Mimoun (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3427-2974)
- Naomi Murdoch (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9701-4075)
- G. Martı́nez (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5443-9383)
- Jose Antonio Rodriguez Manfredi
- Donald Banfield
- Sylvestre Maurice
Institutions
- Ames Research Center (US)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory (US)
- Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier (FR)
- University of the Basque Country (ES)
- Université Fédérale de Toulouse Midi-Pyrénées (FR)
- Institut Superieur de l'Aeronautique et de l'Espace (ISAE-SUPAERO) (FR)
- Université Paris Cité (FR)
- Observatoire de Paris (FR)
- Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (US)
- Sorbonne Université (FR)
- Aeolis Research (United States) (US)
- Laboratoire d’études spatiales et d’instrumentation en astrophysique (FR)
- Centro de Astrobiología (ES)
- Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie (FR)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Published
- 2026-04-25
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1029/2025gl117975
- Primary Topic
- Planetary Science and Exploration
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades