Spectrophotometric properties of CoPhyLab’s dust mixtures

Objective: In the framework of the Cometary Physics Laboratory (CoPhyLab) and its sublimation experiments of cometary surface analogues under simulated space conditions, we characterize the properties of intimate mixtures of juniper charcoal and SiO2 chosen as a dust analogue (Lethuillier et al. 2022). We present the details of these investigations for the spectrophotometric properties of the samples. Methods: We measured these properties using a hyperspectral imager and a radio-goniometer. From the samples’ spectra, we evaluated reflectance ratios and spectral slopes. From the measured phase curves, we inverted a photometric model for all samples. Complementary characterizations were obtained using a pycnometer, a scanning electron microscope and an organic elemental analyser. Results: We report the first values for the apparent porosity, elemental composition, and VIS-NIR spectrophotometric properties for juniper charcoal, as well as for intimate mixtures of this charcoal with the SiO2. We find that the juniper charcoal drives the spectrophotometric properties of the intimate mixtures and that its strong absorbance is consistent with its elemental composition. We find that SiO2 particles form large and compact agglomerates in every mixture imaged with the electron microscope, and its spectrophotometric properties are affected by such features and their particle-size distribution. We compare our results to the current literature on comets and other small Solar system bodies and find that most of the characterized properties of the dust analogue are comparable to some extent with the spacecraft-visited cometary nuclei, as well as to Centaurs, Trojans, and the bluest TNOs.