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Whispering gallery effects in the troposphere
Author(s) -
Hitney Herbert V.
Publication year - 1992
Publication title -
radio science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.371
H-Index - 84
eISSN - 1944-799X
pISSN - 0048-6604
DOI - 10.1029/92rs01783
Subject(s) - optics , troposphere , physics , radio propagation , duct (anatomy) , computational physics , atmospheric sciences , astronomy , medicine , pathology
Experimental data that recorded higher‐than‐expected signals at 3087.7 MHz far beyond the horizon in the presence of an elevated duct are examined and compared to results from the radio physical optics (RPO) propagation model. RPO is a range‐dependent hybrid model that combines ray optics and parabolic equation methods. Previous modeling of this same case study using waveguide methods for both the measured elevated duct and hypothetical evaporation ducts has been disappointing. However, when the elevated duct is allowed to rise slowly with increasing range, the RPO results closely match the observed signal levels, indicating that weakly attenuated Earth‐detached, or whispering gallery, modes were the dominant propagation mechanism.