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Depletion core in ionospheric depletion experiments: Snowplow effects or plasma recombination?
Author(s) -
Yau A. W.
Publication year - 1984
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/gl011i004p00319
Subject(s) - plasma , ionosphere , core (optical fiber) , explosive material , ion , depletion region , physics , atomic physics , chemistry , geophysics , optics , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics , semiconductor
In F‐region ionospheric depletion experiments involving the explosive release of reactive molecular vapour such as H 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 , a depletion core of ≳5 km diameter is formed within a few seconds of the release, where the plasma density is depleted by more than a decade. This paper examines the depletion core formation mechanism in the Lagopedo and Waterhole experiments. It is found that the "snowplow" model is inconsistent with observation. The core region is shown to be caused primarily by rapid three‐body ion recombinations during the initial, self‐continuum phase of the expansion. An analytic model is derived to estimate the extent of plasma depletion in the core region due to three‐body H 3 O + ion recombination reaction, and the estimate is compared with experiment.