Unusual nighttime impulsive enhancements of electron density characterizing the low-latitude ionosphere: Phenomenology and possible mechanisms of triggering

Unusual nighttime impulsive electron density enhancements that are rarely observed at low latitudes on a wide region of South America are here investigated. These phenomena are very atypical because besides being of brief duration, they are characterized by a pronounced compression of the ionosphere. The events were studied and analyzed using both the F2 layer critical frequency (foF2) and the lowest virtual height of the ordinary trace of the F region (h'F) values recorded at five ionospheric stations widely distributed in space. A careful analysis of isoheight ionosonde plots suggests that traveling ionospheric disturbances (TIDs) caused by atmospheric gravity wave (AGW) propagation could play a significant role in causing these phenomena, both for quiet and for medium-high geomagnetic activity; in the latter case however a nocturnal recharging of the fountain effect, due to electric fields penetrating from the magnetosphere, plays an as much significant role

IONORT: a Windows software tool to calculate the HF ray tracing in the ionosphere

This paper describes an applicative software tool, named IONORT (IONOspheric Ray Tracing), for calculating a three-dimensional ray tracing of high frequency waves in the ionospheric medium. This tool runs under Windows operating systems and its friendly graphical user interface facilitates both the numerical data input/output and the two/three-dimensional visualization of the ray path. In order to calculate the coordinates of the ray and the three components of the wave vector along the path as dependent variables, the core of the program solves a system of six first order differential equations, the group path being the independent variable of integration. IONORT uses a three-dimensional electron density specification of the ionosphere, as well as by geomagnetic field and neutral particles-electrons collision frequency models having validity in the area of interest.Comment: 25 pages, 7 figures, 2 table

Condições microclimáticas em cultivo de café conilon a pleno sol e arborizado com nogueira macadâmia.

Medições microclimáticas (radiação fotossinteticamente ativa - RFA, temperatura do ar, umidade relativa do ar e velocidade do vento) foram realizadas em um cultivo de café Conilon (Coffea canephora Pierre) cultivado a pleno sol e arborizado com nogueira macadâmia (Macadamia integrifolia Maiden & Betche), no Município de São Mateus, Espírito Santo (ES) (18°43'S; 39°54'W; 39m), durante o período de setembro de 2008 a junho de 2009, com o objetivo de apresentar os efeitos do cultivo arborizado no microclima. Os resultados obtidos mostraram diferenças na transmissividade à RFA dentro do sistema arborizado em relação ao pleno sol, com variações de 18 a 88% e de 17 a 87% quando comparados em dois episódios de amostragem. A transmissividade média da RFA provocada pelas árvores de macadâmia variou de 65 a 59% durante as duas épocas de amostragem. Com relação à velocidade do vento, ocorreu uma redução média de 72% em sua incidência no cultivo arborizado. As diferenças na transmissividade de radiação e na incidência de ventos proporcionaram diferentes regimes de temperatura do ar e umidade relativa do ar, com maior efeito sobre os valores diurnos e no ponto de amostragem próximo ao renque de macadâmias, em que a média da temperatura máxima do ar foi até 2,2°C inferior ao cultivo a pleno sol

On the influence of solar activity on the mid-latitude sporadic E layer

To investigate the influence of solar cycle variability on the sporadic E layer (Es), hourly measurements of the critical frequency of the Es ordinary mode of propagation, foEs, and of the blanketing frequency of the Es layer, fbEs, recorded from January 1976 to December 2009 at the Rome (Italy) ionospheric station (41.8° N, 12.5° E), were examined. The results are: (1) a high positive correlation between the F10.7 solar index and foEs as well as between F10.7 and fbEs, both for the whole data set and for each solar cycle separately, the correlation between F10.7 and fbEs being much higher than the one between F10.7 and foEs; (2) a decreasing long-term trend of the F10.7, foEs and fbEs time series, with foEs decreasing more rapidly than F10.7 and fbEs; (3) clear and statistically significant peaks at 11 years in the foEs and fbEs time series, inferred from Lomb-Scargle periodograms

Alterações microclimáticas em cultivo de café conilon arborizado com coqueiro-anão-verde.

Medições microclimáticas (radiação fotossinteticamente ativa - RFA, temperatura do ar, umidade relativa do ar e velocidade do vento) foram realizadas em cultivos de café Conilon (Coffea canephora Pierre) a pleno sol e arborizados com coqueiro-anão-verde (Cocus nucifera L.), no município de São Mateus, ES (18º45? S; 40º11? W; 70 metros), durante o período de outubro de 2008 a junho de 2009, com o objetivo de apresentar os efeitos do cultivo arborizado no microclima. Os resultados obtidos mostraram diferenças na transmissão da RFA dentro do sistema arborizado em comparação ao cultivo a pleno sol, com variações de 58 a 80% e 57 a 86% quando comparados dois episódios de amostragem. A transmissividade média da RFA provocada pelas plantas de coqueiro variou de 73 a 70% durante as duas épocas de amostragem. Com relação a velocidade do vento ocorreu uma redução média de 35% em sua incidência no cultivo arborizado. As diferenças na transmissão de radiação e na incidência de ventos proporcionaram diferentes regimes de temperatura do ar e umidade relativa do ar, com maior efeito sobre os valores diurnos e no ponto de amostragem situado na linha de coqueiros, onde a média da temperatura máxima foi até 1,7 ºC inferior ao cultivo a pleno sol

Can the polarization tagging of the ionogram trace deceive autoscaling methods? The Learmonth case

This paper focuses on the problem of invalid O/X polarization tagging of an ionogram and how this can affect ionogram autoscaling methods. To illustrate this problem, 623 ionograms recorded in March and April 2004 (days 080-105) by the digisonde 256 installed at Learmonth (22.3° S, 114.1° E) were considered. These ionograms, often characterized by very unreliable O/X polarization tagging of the echoes because of unresolved antenna issues, have been autoscaled by both ARTIST 4.2 and Autoscala. Results of comparisons between automatically and manually scaled foF2 data are shown for both programs, considering as acceptable an autoscaled value that lies within 0.5 MHz of the manual value. Autoscala values of foF2 agree with the manually-scaled values for ~99% of ionograms, while ARTIST values of foF2 agree with the manually-scaled values for ~75% of ionograms. While ARTIST was coded on the assumption of valid polarization tagging, the fact remains that it produces invalid results when equipment issues cause invalid tagging. Autoscaling procedures that do not use the polarization tagging will generally work better than ARTIST in such cases. However, these other procedures are susceptible to failure in other situations

On the solar cycle dependence of the amplitude modulation characterizing the mid-latitude sporadic E layer diurnal periodicity

Spectral analyses are employed to investigate how the diurnal periodicity of the critical frequency of the sporadic E (Es) layer varies with solar activity. The study is based on ionograms recorded at the ionospheric station of Rome (41.8°N, 12.5°E), Italy, from 1976 to 2009, a period of time covering three solar cycles. It was confirmed that the diurnal periodicity is always affected by an amplitude modulation with periods of several days, which is the proof that Es layers are affected indirectly by planetary waves through their non linear interaction with atmospheric tides at lower altitudes. The most striking features coming out from this study is however that this amplitude modulation is greater for high-solar activity than for low-solar activity

A Software for Automatic Scaling of foF2 and MUF(3000)F2 from Ionograms

A software for automatic scaling of critical frequency f0F2 and MUF(3000)F2 is presented. The program is designed to scale the ionograms without using information on polarization and can be applied to both single antenna systems and crossed antenna systems. A data set of 619 ionograms recorded at the ionospheric observatory of Rome has been used to test the performance of the software. The test has been performed comparing the values obtained automatically with the ones obtained by the standard manual method

Sporadic E layer at mid-latitudes: average properties and influence of atmospheric tides

Abstract. This paper describes a study of the daily variability shown by the main characteristics of the sporadic E (Es) layer, that is the top frequency (ftEs) and the lowest virtual height (h'Es). The study is based on ionograms recorded by the Advanced Ionospheric Sounder by the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (AIS-INGV) ionosondes installed in the ionospheric stations at Rome (41.8° N, 12.5° E) and Gibilmanna (37.9° N, 14.0° E), Italy, during the summer (June, July, August and September) of 2013, a year falling in the ascending phase of solar cycle 24. The ftEs presents a diurnal variation characterized by two maxima, the first around noon is very well defined and the second in the evening/night is much less defined; the amplitude of both maxima decreases from June to September accompanied by a general decrease of the ftEs values which is more pronounced in the daytime than in the nighttime. h'Es also presents a diurnal variation characterized by two maxima but, unlike ftEs, these present the same amplitude which is independent from the considered month. Assuming that both ftEs and h'Es trends are influenced by the atmospheric tides, the height–time–intensity (HTI) technique was applied to deeply investigate how these waves control the Es dynamics. The HTI study, along with a fast Fourier transform analysis, show that a well-defined semidiurnal periodicity characterizes the Es layer dynamics most accurately in June and July, while in August and September the daytime semidiurnal periodicity becomes weaker and the role of the diurnal periodicity is consequently highlighted