Multi-frequency HF radar measurements of artificial F-region field-aligned irregularities

• Main Authors: Senior, A., Borisov, N. D., Kosch, M. J., Yeoman, T. K., Honary, F., Rietveld, M. T.
• Other Authors: Dept. of Communication Systems, Pushkov Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism, Ionosphere and Radio Wave Propagation (IZMIRAN), Russian Academy of Sciences Moscow (RAS), Department of Physics and Astronomy Leicester, University of Leicester, EISCAT Scientific Association
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2004
• Subjects: [SDU.OCEAN]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Ocean; Atmosphere; [SDU.STU]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences; EISCAT
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-00317682; https://hal.science/hal-00317682/document; https://hal.science/hal-00317682/file/angeo-22-3503-2004.pdf

International audience We present radar backscatter power measurements using the CUTLASS HF radar at Hankasalmi, Finland from F-region field-aligned irregularities induced by HF radio pumping with the EISCAT Heating facility. A novel radar operating mode is used in which the radar frequency is rapidly swept through a number of bands, making use of the varying ionospheric refraction to probe different heights within the heated region. We obtain height profiles of backscatter power which correspond to e -folding scale lengths of around 20km for the mean-square electron density perturbations for pump wave interaction heights in the region of 240-250km in daytime conditions. The results are in agreement with previous measurements made by other techniques. We discuss some problems with the method and suggest improvements for future experiments.