On the fast movements of the thermosphere: an interpretation

We examine the oscillations of the meridional neutral wind in the F region as seen by the EISCAT radar. We propose an interpretation in term of eddies ( tourbillons ) of typical size of a few tens to a few hundreds of kilometers. The observed rotation velocity is a few hundreds of meters per second....

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Published in:Annales Geophysicae
Main Authors: Lilensten, J., Amblard, P. O.
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: 2018
Subjects:
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1007/s00585-001-1651-8
https://angeo.copernicus.org/articles/18/1651/2000/
Description
Summary:We examine the oscillations of the meridional neutral wind in the F region as seen by the EISCAT radar. We propose an interpretation in term of eddies ( tourbillons ) of typical size of a few tens to a few hundreds of kilometers. The observed rotation velocity is a few hundreds of meters per second. We suggest that the tourbillons are a common feature of thermospheric movements. We propose an optical experiment to check the validity of this assumption. Key words: Atmospheric composition and structure (thermosphere · composition and chemistry) · Ionosphere (ionosphere · atmosphere interactions)