Acceleration mechanism of high-speed neutral wind observed in the polar lower thermosphere

Details Acceleration mechanism of high-speed neutral wind observed in the polar lower thermosphere Acceleration mechanism of high-speed neutral wind observed in the polar lower thermosphere

Apr 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009jgra..11404322t&link_type=abstract

Journal of Geophysical Research, Volume 114, Issue A4, CiteID A04322

Physics

3

Atmospheric Processes: Thermospheric Dynamics (0358), Ionosphere: Ionosphere/Atmosphere Interactions (0335), Ionosphere: Ionosphere/Magnetosphere Interactions (2736), Ionosphere: Polar Cap Ionosphere, Atmospheric Processes: Remote Sensing

Scientific paper

We analyzed data obtained with the European incoherent scatter (EISCAT) Svalbard Radar (ESR) at Longyearbyen (78.2°N, 16.0°E in geographic coordinates, 75.2°Λ in invariant latitude) to advance our understanding of the acceleration mechanism of the lower thermospheric neutral wind when the ionospheric convection becomes enhanced. The Advanced Composition Explorer satellite observed a southward turning in the interplanetary magnetic field at 0843 UT on 16 June 2005. At 0900 UT, the F region ion velocity and the lower thermospheric neutral wind (at 118-km altitude) observed with the ESR began to accelerate significantly in the westward and northwestward directions, respectively. The neutral wind was remarkably accelerated within 1 hour from 0900 UT, and its speed became a value of ˜500 m s-1 at 1000 UT. The wind speed was significantly higher than a typical wind speed at 118 km. We evaluated the ion drag contribution on the generation of the high-speed neutral wind. Our evaluation verifies that the ion drag force could not generate the high-speed neutral wind within such a short time (˜1 hour). This result implies that the major driving force was the horizontal pressure gradient force induced by the Joule heating. We deduced the contribution of the pressure gradient force based on a quantitative estimation of the Joule-heating-induced pressure gradient from the ESR and the Super Dual Auroral Radar Network data. We concluded that the pressure gradient force was the most probable force in this event.

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