Total Electron Content PCA-NN Prediction Model for South-European Middle Latitudes

A regression-based model was previously developed to forecast total electron content (TEC) at middle latitudes. We present a more sophisticated model using neural networks (NN) instead of linear regression. This regional model prototype simulates and forecasts TEC variations in relation to space wea...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Atmosphere
Main Authors: Anna Morozova, Teresa Barata, Tatiana Barlyaeva, Ricardo Gafeira
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2023
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Online Access:https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14071058
https://doaj.org/article/d0f9bae0431b4d18b22845a3f1ee3143
Description
Summary:A regression-based model was previously developed to forecast total electron content (TEC) at middle latitudes. We present a more sophisticated model using neural networks (NN) instead of linear regression. This regional model prototype simulates and forecasts TEC variations in relation to space weather conditions. The development of a prototype consisted of the selection of the best set of predictors, NN architecture, and the length of the input series. Tests made using the data from December 2014 to June 2018 show that the PCA-NN model based on a simple feed-forward NN with a very limited number (up to six) of space weather predictors performs better than the PCA-MRM model that uses up to 27 space weather predictors. The prototype is developed on a TEC series obtained from a GNSS receiver at Lisbon airport and tested on TEC series from three other locations at middle latitudes of the Eastern North Atlantic. Conclusions on the dependence of the forecast quality on longitude and latitude are made.