Analysis of ionospheric scintillation characteristics in sub-antarctica region with GNSS data at macquarie Island

• Published in: Sensors
• Main Authors: Guo, K, Liu, Y, Zhao, Y, Wang, J
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: MDPI 2017
• Subjects: GNSS signals; ionospheric scintillation; sub-Antarctica region; temporal and spatial characteristics; anzsrc-for: 0301 Analytical Chemistry; anzsrc-for: 0502 Environmental Science and Management; anzsrc-for: 0602 Ecology; anzsrc-for: 0805 Distributed Computing; anzsrc-for: 0906 Electrical and Electronic Engineering; Antarc*; Antarctica; Macquarie Island
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/unsworks_53506; https://doi.org/10.3390/s17010137

Ionospheric scintillation has a great impact on radio propagation and electronic system performance, thus is extensively studied currently. The influence of scintillation on Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) is particularly evident, making GNSS an effective medium to study characteristics of scintillation. Ionospheric scintillation varies greatly in relation with temporal and spatial distribution. In this paper, both temporal and spatial characteristics of scintillation are investigated based on Macquarie Island’s GNSS scintillation data collected from 2011 to 2015. Experiments demonstrate that occurrence rates of amplitude scintillation have a close relationship with solar activity, while phase scintillation is more likely to be generated by geomagnetic activity. In addition, scintillation distribution behaviors related to elevation and azimuth angles are statistically analyzed for both amplitude and phase scintillation. The proposed work is valuable for a deeper understanding of theoretical mechanisms of ionospheric scintillation in this region, and provides a reference for GNSS applications in certain regions around sub-Antarctica.