Observation of the Descent of Mesospheric Air above the Arctic during the Northern Winter 2009/2010 using the Tracer CO

Details Observation of the Descent of Mesospheric Air above the Arctic during the Northern Winter 2009/2010 using the Tracer CO Observation of the Descent of Mesospheric Air above the Arctic during the Northern Winter 2009/2010 using the Tracer CO

Dec 2010

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2010agufmsa31b1732h&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2010, abstract #SA31B-1732

Physics

[0340] Atmospheric Composition And Structure / Middle Atmosphere: Composition And Chemistry, [0341] Atmospheric Composition And Structure / Middle Atmosphere: Constituent Transport And Chemistry, [3334] Atmospheric Processes / Middle Atmosphere Dynamics, [3394] Atmospheric Processes / Instruments And Techniques

Scientific paper

In the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT), NOx is produced by solar high-energy radiation. It can then be transported into the polar winter stratosphere by the large-scale circulation of the middle atmosphere. In this region, NOx acts as catalyst for ozone destruction. Parts of the ozone variability can therefore be induced by either the varying NOx production in the MLT region or the varying strength of the downward transport into the stratosphere. For the quantification of the latter, the influence of dynamics, observations of the respective descent rates are needed. They can be obtained from measurements of CO profiles, since CO is a tracer for dynamics in this region. We have been performing ground-based microwave observations of CO since 2007 above Kiruna, Sweden (67.8° N), covering an altitude range of 40km to 80km. We present the analysis of the measured timeseries for the northern winter 2009/2010. Main dynamical features of the polar winter middle atmosphere can clearly be seen in the data: the descent of mesospheric air in autumn 2009, the occurrence of the sudden stratospheric warming in January 2010 after which the descent proceeds, and the breakup of the vortex in spring 2010. Although the vertical resolution of the measurements is limited with about 15 km, an altitude-dependent evolution of this features is observed.

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