Comparison of SuperDARN peak electron density estimates based on elevation angle measurements to ionosonde and incoherent scatter radar measurements

• Published in: Earth, Planets and Space
• Main Authors: Alexander V. Koustov, Sydney Ullrich, Pavlo V. Ponomarenko, Robert G. Gillies, David R. Themens, Nozomu Nishitani
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: SpringerOpen 2020
• Subjects: F region electron density; SuperDARN radars; Elevation angles; CADI ionosonde; RISR incoherent scatter radar; Geography. Anthropology. Recreation; G; Geodesy; QB275-343; Geology; QE1-996.5; Rankin Inlet; Resolute Bay
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1186/s40623-020-01170-w; https://doaj.org/article/e3e4af172750418795d599d527f83dce

Abstract Measurements of the electron density at the F region peak by the Canadian Advanced Digital Ionosonde (CADI) and the Resolute Incoherent Scatter Radar (RISR) are used to assess the quality of peak electron density estimates made from elevation angle measurements by the Super Dual Auroral Radar Network (SuperDARN) high-frequency radar at Rankin Inlet (RKN). All three instruments monitor the ionosphere near Resolute Bay. The CADI-RKN joint dataset comprises measurements between 2008 and 2017 while RISR-RKN dataset covers about 60 daylong events in 2016. Reasonable agreement between the RKN estimates and measurements by CADI and RISR is shown. Two minor discrepancies are discussed: RKN radar daytime peak electron density overestimation by ~ 10% and underestimation by up to 30% in other time sectors. In winter nighttime and dawn, cases were identified in which the RKN radar significantly overestimates the peak electron density. This occurs when the phase in the RKN interferometer measurements is incorrectly shifted by $$ 2\uppi $$ 2 π , and this is most significant when electron densities are low. Statistical fitting to the joint data sets, split into four time sectors of a day, has been done and parameters of the fit have been determined. These allow slight adjustment of measured real-time RKN values to better reflect real peak electron densities in the ionosphere within its field of view.