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The 2‐Day Photochemical Oscillations in the Mesopause Region: The First Experimental Evidence?
Author(s) -
Kulikov M. Yu.,
Belikovich M. V.,
Feigin A. M.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2021gl092795
Subject(s) - mesopause , thermosphere , mesosphere , atmospheric sciences , diffusion , environmental science , satellite , physics , thermodynamics , geophysics , ionosphere , stratosphere , astronomy
In this study, we analyze the main features of the 2‐day photochemical oscillations (2DPO) in the mesopause region (80–90 km) caused by the nonlinear response of mesospheric chemistry to 1‐day variations of solar radiation. The main indicators of 2DPO useful for subsequent detection of this phenomenon in satellite data are extracted from the theoretical data sets obtained using different chemical‐transport modeling approaches. The indicators are applied to find examples of these oscillations in the nighttime profiles of H and O concentration for the year 2003, taken from the SABER database. The 2DPO appearance/suppression is controlled by a local value of vertical eddy diffusion coefficientD z zwhich is a critical parameter for three‐dimensional constituent distributions in the upper mesosphere and lower thermosphere. Thus, the experimental registration of 2DPO can be used to validate and subsequently improve the retrieval procedures in future determinations of a detailed distribution ofD z z.