Post‐SL9 sulfur photochemistry on Jupiter

We have modeled the photochemical evolution of the sulfur‐containing species that were observed in Jupiter's stratosphere after the SL9 impacts. We find that most of the sulfur is converted to S8 in the first few days. Other important sulfur reservoirs are CS, whose abundance increases markedly with time, and possibly H2CS, HNCS, and NS, whose abundances depend on kinetic reaction rates that are unknown at the present. We discuss the temporal variation of the major sulfur compounds, make abundance and compositional predictions useful for comparisons with observations, and discuss the possible condensation of sulfur‐containing species.