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Na temperature lidar measurements of gravity wave perturbations of wind, density and temperature in the mesopause region
Author(s) -
She C. Y.,
Yu J. R.,
Huang J. W.,
Nagasawa C.,
Gardner C. S.
Publication year - 1991
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 - 10.1029/91gl01517
Subject(s) - mesopause , lidar , gravity wave , atmospheric sciences , wind shear , environmental science , mesosphere , altitude (triangle) , wind speed , atmospheric temperature , meteorology , stratosphere , geology , gravitational wave , physics , remote sensing , astrophysics , geometry , mathematics
High resolution temperature profiles of the mesopause region above Fort Collins, CO (40.6°N,105°W) were measured with a Na lidar on the nights of March 2–3 and April 15–16, 1990, during the ALOHA‐90 campaign. This paper reports the initial scientific analysis of these data which were used to compute (1) the altitude profiles of relative atmospheric temperature perturbations, (2) the mean Brunt‐Vaisala frequency in the mesopause region, and (3) the vertical shear variance of horizontal winds. On March 2–3 and April 15–16, the rms temperature perturbations were 5.7% and 7.1%, the average Brunt‐Vaisala periods were 4.9 min and 4.6 min, and the wind shear variances were 878 (ms −1 /km)² and 967 (ms −1 /km)², respectively.