The study of polarized sunlight scattered from planetary atmospheres provides diagnostic tools that can help explore the possible composition and size distribution of clouds and aerosol particles. Previous studies have shown the potential of this technique in studying Water clouds on Earth and in the discovery of Sulphuric Acid clouds on Venus. The atmosphere of Mars is unique as it hosts three different types of aerosols: water (H₂O) ice, carbon dioxide (CO₂) ice and dust. We considered scenarios analogous to Martian conditions and calculated the single and multiple scattering polarization for Martian dust, water ice and carbon dioxide ice with the help of a Radiative Transfer algorithm for Nadir and Limb spacecraft observation positions. The polarization features (-Q/I) of Mars atmosphere have low amplitude and have been found to be within the range of ±0.1 in the Nadir/Limb geometry for the spherical, spheroidal and cylindrical shapes considered here. We study its dependence upon the observation geometry, shape, size and composition of the scatterer. Future spacecraft studies of microphysical properties of dust and clouds through polarization will reveal the nature of condensation processes active in the Martian atmosphere.

对从行星大气中散射的偏振太阳光的研究提供了诊断工具，可以帮助探索云和气溶胶颗粒的可能组成和大小分布。先前的研究表明，该技术在研究地球上的水云以及在金星上发现硫酸云的潜力。火星的大气是独特的，因为它拥有三种不同类型的气溶胶：水（H ₂ O）冰，二氧化碳（CO ₂）冰和灰尘。我们考虑了类似于火星条件的情景，并借助辐射对天底和肢体航天器观测位置的辐射转移算法，计算了火星尘埃，水冰和二氧化碳冰的单次和多次散射极化。火星大气的极化特征（-Q / I）具有低振幅，对于此处考虑的球形，椭球形和圆柱形，在天底/肢体几何中发现其处于±0.1的范围内。我们研究了它对散射体的观测几何形状，形状，大小和组成的依赖性。未来的航天器通过极化对尘埃和云的微物理性质进行研究，将揭示在火星大气中活跃的凝结过程的性质。