Cite this as (APA format)
Piccialli, A. (2026). Zonal thermal winds and temperatures on Venus from VIRTIS-M/Venus Express (Version 1) [Data set]. Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy. https://doi.org/10.18758/ovddfl14
Technical info
| Resource format | HDF |
|---|---|
| Resource size | 36.8 MB |
Additional info
| Data last updated | June 30, 2026 |
|---|---|
| Metadata last updated | June 30, 2026 |
| Created | June 8, 2026 |
Zonal Wind Products
This dataset contains all zonal wind products derived from VIRTIS-M temperature retrievals using the cyclostrophic thermal wind equation.
The archive is provided as a .zip file and contains four components:
Virtis_M_winds_All_orbits.h5winds_orbits/winds_LT_1hr/error_winds/
1. Virtis_M_winds_All_orbits.h5
This file contains the zonal wind retrievals for all VIRTIS-M observations combined into a single dataset.
The data are stored in HDF5 format and contains:
- alt = Altitude corresponding to the pressure grid [km]
- Lat_grid = Latitude grid used for the binned temperature field [degree]
- Lat_North = Latitude grid used for the Northern Hemisphere winds [degree]
- Lat_South = Latitude grid used for the Southern Hemisphere winds [degree]
- press = Pressure grid [mbar]
- Temp_grid = Binned temperature field used to derive the winds [K]
- U_North = Retrieved zonal wind field in the Northern Hemisphere [m s⁻¹]
- U_South = Retrieved zonal wind field in the Southern Hemisphere [m s⁻¹]
2. winds_orbits/
This directory contains one HDF5 file for each individual VIRTIS-M observation (orbit).
Each file follows the naming convention
Virtis_M_winds_<ObservationName>.h5
and contains the same HDF5 structure as Virtis_M_winds_All_orbits.h5
3. winds_LT_1hr/
This directory contains wind fields obtained after averaging temperature retrievals within 1-hour Local Solar Time (LST) bins.
Each HDF5 file corresponds to one LST interval and follows the naming convention
Virtis_M_winds_Temp_All_LT_xx-xx.h5
The HDF5 structure is identical to the files in winds_orbits/.
4. error_winds/
This directory contains the uncertainty analysis associated with the retrieved zonal winds.
For each VIRTIS-M observation, an HDF5 file stores the nominal wind solution together with wind fields recalculated after perturbing the retrieved temperatures by the ±1σ and ±2σ uncertainty curves. These files can be used to assess the sensitivity of the thermal wind retrieval to temperature uncertainties.
Each file is organized into three HDF5 groups.
Geometry
- Obs_name = Original VIRTIS-M observation filename
- Lat = Latitude of each temperature profile [degree]
- Lat_grid = Latitude grid of the binned temperatures [degree]
- Lat_North = Latitude grid used for Northern Hemisphere winds [degree]
- Lat_South = Latitude grid used for Southern Hemisphere winds [degree]
Winds
- press = Pressure grid [mbar]
- alt = Altitude corresponding to the pressure grid [km]
- U_North = Nominal Northern Hemisphere zonal wind [m s⁻¹]
- U_South = Nominal Southern Hemisphere zonal wind [m s⁻¹]
Wind fields computed from perturbed temperature profiles:
- U_1_p_N = Northern Hemisphere winds using the +1σ temperature profile
- U_1_n_N = Northern Hemisphere winds using the −1σ temperature profile
- U_2_p_N = Northern Hemisphere winds using the +2σ temperature profile
-
U_2_n_N = Northern Hemisphere winds using the −2σ temperature profile
-
U_1_p_S = Southern Hemisphere winds using the +1σ temperature profile
- U_1_n_S = Southern Hemisphere winds using the −1σ temperature profile
- U_2_p_S = Southern Hemisphere winds using the +2σ temperature profile
- U_2_n_S = Southern Hemisphere winds using the −2σ temperature profile
Errors
Temperature uncertainties used to generate the perturbed wind fields:
- sigma_1_p = Temperature field corresponding to the +1σ curve [K]
- sigma_1_n = Temperature field corresponding to the −1σ curve [K]
- sigma_2_p = Temperature field corresponding to the +2σ curve [K]
- sigma_2_n = Temperature field corresponding to the −2σ curve [K]
Reference temperature products:
- Temp_grid = Binned temperature field used for the nominal wind retrieval [K]
- Temp = Original retrieved temperature profiles [K]