Time and Altitude spread F echoes distribution over the Christmas Island VHF radar

The goal of this work is to study the time and altitude echoes characteristics under different solar and seasonality conditions using the VHF radar RTI images. The occurrence of equatorial spread F depends on the existence of conditions that can seed the Raileight-Taylor instability, and these conditions can change with solar flux, seasonality, longitude distributions, and day-to-day variability. So, the equatorial spread F is observed as its time and altitude occurrence. The VHF radar of Christmas Island (2.0° N, 157.4° W, 2.9° N dip latitude) has been operational in the equatorial region for some time now, allowing long-term observations. The occurrence of echoes during solar minimum conditions are observed all throughout the night since the post reversal westward electric field is weaker than the solar maximum and the possibilities for the vertical plasma drift to become positive are larger. On other hand, echoes during solar maximum will be controlled by dynamics near the time of the Pre-reversal Peak (PRE). Our results indicate peak time occurrence of echoes along this period shows a well-defined pattern, with echoes being distributed as closer to local sunset during solar maximum and around/closer midnight during solar minimum conditions, meanwhile, the peak altitude occurrence of echoes shows a slightly regular pattern with higher altitude occurrences during solar maxima and lower altitudes during solar minimum conditions.

Co-observation of strongly convective precipitation using VHF atmospheric radar and dual-polarized microwave radiometer during a typhoon passage

The Chung-Li very-high-frequency (VHF at 52 MHz) atmospheric radar and a dual-polarized microwave radiometer were operated collaboratively to investigate strongly convective precipitation while the typhoon Trami just passed through the Taiwan in Aug, 2013. First, respective Doppler velocities of clear-air and precipitation echoes were identified automatically by the VHF radar as clearly as possible. Two approaches were designed for this purpose: contour-based and peak-finding processes. The two approaches initially determined some major spectral centers or peaks, which were usually redundant, and then proper sifting and clustering were performed for the redundant spectral centers or peaks to yield several mean locations of Doppler velocities for profiling. The outcomes of the two approaches were consistent in general. With the estimated Doppler velocities, a tracing process was developed for Doppler profiling, in which Doppler velocity shear was one of the significant criteria in the tracing process. The radar echoes collected by the VHF radar during rainy and strongly convective atmosphere have been investigated to validate the two approaches and the tracing process. About 98 % of the tracings could identify the Doppler profiles of clear air and precipitation, even the atmosphere was disturbed severely. The radar spectral parameters, Doppler profiles, and the information from a dual-polarized microwave radiometer as well as the simulation of weather model, were examined jointly. It signified that strong updraft and turbulent atmosphere could bring the liquid water to the height above the melting layer, and then the Bergeron effect and coalescence process on formation of ice crystal and graupel above the height of the melting layer occurred accordingly.

Hierarchical Deconvolution for Incoherent Scatter Radar Data

We propose a novel method for deconvolving incoherent scatter radar data to recover accurate reconstructions of backscattered powers. The problem is modelled as a hierarchical noise-perturbed deconvolution problem, where the lower hierarchy consists of an adaptive length-scale function that allows for a non-stationary prior and as such enables adaptive recovery of smooth and narrow layers in the profiles. The estimation is done in a Bayesian statistical inversion framework as a two-step procedure, where hyperparameters are first estimated by optimisation and followed by an analytical closed-form solution of the deconvolved signal. The proposed optimisation based method is compared to a fully probabilistic approach using Markov Chain Monte Carlo techniques enabling additional uncertainty quantification. In this paper we examine the potential of the hierarchical deconvolution approach using two different prior models for the length-scale function.We apply the developed methodology to compute the backscattered powers of measured Polar MesosphericWinter Echoes, as well as Summer Echoes, from the EISCAT VHF radar in Tromsø, Norway. Computational accuracy and performance are tested using a simulated signal corresponding to a typical background ionosphere and a sporadic E layer with known ground-truth. The results suggest that the proposed hierarchical deconvolution approach can recover accurate and clean reconstructions of profiles, and the potential to be successfully applied to similar problems.

Charged dust in the D-region incoherent scatter spectrum

We investigate the influence of charged dust on the incoherent scatter from the D-region ionosphere. Incoherent scatter is observed with high-power, large aperture radars and results from electromagnetic waves scattering at electrons that are coupled to other charged components through plasma oscillations. The influence of charged dust can hence be considered an effect of dusty plasma. The D-region contains meteoric smoke particles that are of nanometre size and form from incoming ablating meteors. Detection of such charged dust in the incoherent scatter spectrum from the D-region has previously been proposed and studied to some degree. We here present model calculations to investigate the influence of the charged dust component with a size distribution, instead of the one size dust components assumed in other works. The developed code to calculate the incoherent scatter spectrum from the D-region including dust particles with different sizes and different positive and negative charge states is made available (https://doi.org/10.18710/GHZIIY). We investigate how sizes, number density and charge state of the dust influence the spectrum during different ionospheric conditions. We consider the ionospheric parameters for the location of the EISCAT VHF radar during a year and find that conditions are most suitable for dust detection in winter below 80 km at times with increased electron densities. The prospects to derive dust parameters increase, when the incoherent scatter observations are combined with those of other instruments to provide independent information on electron density, neutral density and temperature.

Effect of neutral winds on the creation of non-specular meteor trail echoes

Non-specular meteor trail echoes are radar reflections from plasma instabilities that are caused by field-aligned irregularities. Meteor simulations are examined to show that these plasma instabilities, and thus the associated meteor trail echo, strongly depend on the meteoroid properties and the characteristics of the atmosphere in which the meteoroid is embedded. The effects of neutral winds, as a function of altitude, are analyzed to understand how their amplitude variability impacts the temporal–space signatures of non-specular meteor trail echoes present in very high-frequency (VHF) radar observations. It is found that amplitudes of the total horizontal neutral wind smaller than 0.6 m s−1 do not provide the right physical conditions to enable the genesis of non-specular meteor echoes. It is also found that a 0.0316 µg meteoroid traveling at 35 km s−1 can be seen as a meteor trail echo if the amplitudes of horizontal neutral winds are stronger than 15 m s−1. In contrast, a 0.316 µg meteoroid, traveling at the same speed, requires horizontal winds stronger than 1 m s−1 to be visible as a meteor trail echo. The neutral velocity threshold illustrates how simulations show that no trail echo is created below a critical wind value. This critical wind value is not mapped directly to radar observations, but it is used to shed light on the physics of meteor trails and improve their modeling. The meteor simulations also indicate that time delays on the order of hundreds of milliseconds or longer, between head echoes and non-specular echoes, which are present in VHF backscatter radar maps, can be a consequence of very dense plasma trails being affected by weak horizontal neutral winds that are smaller than 1 m s−1.

Lightning Detection and Imaging Based on VHF Radar Interferometry

In this study, detection and three-dimensional (3D) imaging of lightning plasma channels are presented using radar interferometry. Experiments were carried out in Leshan, China with a 48.2 MHz VHF radar configured with an interferometric antenna array. The typical characteristics of lightning echoes are studied in the form of amplitude, phase, and doppler spectra derived from the raw in-phase/quadrature (I/Q) data. In addition, the 3D structure of lightning channels is reconstructed using the interferometry technique. The localization results of lightning are verified with the locating results of lightning detection networks operating at VLF ranges, which indicate the feasibility of using VHF radar for lightning mapping. The interpretation of the observational results is complicated by the dendric structure of lightning channel and the overlap between passive electromagnetic radiations and return echoes. Nevertheless, some parts of the characteristics of lightning are still evident. The observational result of return echoes shows good consistency with the overdense assumption of lightning channels. The transition from the overdense channel to the underdense channel in the form of amplitude and phase is clearly observed. This technique is very promising to reveal the typical characteristics of lightning return echoes and structure of lightning propagation processes.

Brief communication: New radar constraints support presence of ice older than 1.5 Myr at Little Dome C

The area near Dome C, East Antarctica, is thought to be one of the most promising targets for recovering a continuous ice-core record spanning more than a million years. The European Beyond EPICA consortium has selected Little Dome C (LDC), an area ∼ 35 km southeast of Concordia Station, to attempt to recover such a record. Here, we present the results of the final ice-penetrating radar survey used to refine the exact drill site. These data were acquired during the 2019–2020 austral summer using a new, multi-channel high-resolution very high frequency (VHF) radar operating in the frequency range of 170–230 MHz. This new instrument is able to detect reflectors in the near-basal region, where previous surveys were largely unable to detect horizons. The radar stratigraphy is used to transfer the timescale of the EPICA Dome C ice core (EDC) to the area of Little Dome C, using radar isochrones dating back past 600 ka. We use these data to derive the expected depth–age relationship through the ice column at the now-chosen drill site, termed BELDC (Beyond EPICA LDC). These new data indicate that the ice at BELDC is considerably older than that at EDC at the same depth and that there is about 375 m of ice older than 600 kyr at BELDC. Stratigraphy is well preserved to 2565 m, ∼ 93 % of the ice thickness, below which there is a basal unit with unknown properties. An ice-flow model tuned to the isochrones suggests ages likely reach 1.5 Myr near 2500 m, ∼ 65 m above the basal unit and ∼ 265 m above the bed, with sufficient resolution (19 ± 2 kyr m−1) to resolve 41 kyr glacial cycles.

Observations of spectra of polar mesospheric summer echoes at 224 MHz using EISCAT radar during particle precipitation events – Some case studies from July 2019

<p>We present the initial results from investigation of polar mesospheric summer echoes (PMSE) spectra at 224 MHz observed by EISCAT VHF radar operated from Ramfjordmoen near Tromsø during July 2019. Since EISCAT UHF measurements were not available, we used the sudden enhancements in electron densities derived from the VHF observations above 90 km as indicators of particle precipitation. We note that the altitude extent of the PMSE increased along with an enhancement of the strength of the pre-existing PMSE. However, a closer examination reveals that the PMSE strengths vary significantly between different heights in the region of 80 to 90 km. Interestingly, the spectral widths show well separated regimes between the top and the bottom part of the PMSE layers following particle precipitation. In the altitudes where the maximum enhancement in PMSE backscatter occurred, there is no corresponding enhancement in the spectral widths. The frequency Doppler shifts showed alternating upward and downward motions without much difference before and after the particle precipitation. This indicates that the moderate levels of particle precipitation observed herein did not affect the vertical winds considerably. Further, after the particle precipitation subsided, the PMSE intensities continued to be stronger for a while.</p>