Premium
Some properties of the auroral thermosphere inferred from initial EISCAT observations
Author(s) -
Alcaydé D.,
Fontanari J.,
Bauer P.,
Beaujardière O.
Publication year - 1983
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/rs018i006p00881
Subject(s) - thermosphere , joule heating , incoherent scatter , ionosphere , computational physics , joule effect , atmospheric sciences , radar , electron precipitation , ion , physics , electron , precipitation , altitude (triangle) , electron temperature , photoelectric effect , particle (ecology) , substorm , geophysics , meteorology , plasma , geology , optics , magnetosphere , mathematics , telecommunications , oceanography , quantum mechanics , computer science , geometry
Using the equation of ion energy conservation, preliminary calculations of thermospheric neutral‐temperature profiles and atomic oxygen concentrations are made for 2 days of EISCAT incoherent scatter radar data. Since the original method currently applied at mid‐latitudes is not valid when joule heating of the ions occurs, we extended it to take joule heating into consideration. However, this new method is not valid if joule heating occurs simultaneously with electron heating by particle precipitation or photoelectrons. We show that the electron continuity equation around 200 km altitude can be applied to identify the periods of particle precipitation.