Interhemispheric Transport of the Ionospheric F Region Plasma During the 2009 Sudden Stratosphere Warming

Abstract

The field‐aligned plasma drift in the equatorial ionosphere drives the interhemispheric transport of the ionospheric F region plasma between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. We use the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System satellite measurements, for the first time, to present the responses of the equatorial field‐aligned drift during the 2009 sudden stratosphere warming (SSW). The observations show that the equatorial field‐aligned drift presents a southward disturbance in the morning sector and a large northward disturbance in the afternoon sector and gradually shifts to later local time during the SSW. Further, this new finding of semidiurnal disturbance in field‐aligned drift can well explain the hemispheric differences of the responses of the total electron content to the SSW. Based on the whole atmosphere model Ground‐to‐topside model of Atmosphere and Ionosphere for Aeronomy, it is suggested that the meridional wind can contribute to the disturbance field‐aligned drift. Our results give a new perspective for understanding the ionospheric perturbations during SSWs.

Ionospheric F‐Layer Scintillation Variabilities Over the American Sector During Sudden Stratospheric Warming Events

“…Additionally, the deviation in scintillation occurrence altitude is 18.13 km, which decreases from the pre-SSW period to the SSW period, consistent with the magnitude order of ΔhmF2 observed by COSMIC in the afternoon (Yue et al, 2010). Zhang et al (2020) reported that the disturbance meridional wind made an important contribution to the disturbance field-aligned drifts, inducing the hemispheric difference in the TEC responses to the 2008-2009 SSW event. Similarly, meridional wind can enhance the field line integrated Pedersen conductivity and may also play a role in reducing ionospheric irregularity activity during the SSW period (de Paula et al, 2015).…”

“…Liu et al, 2011J. Liu et al, 2019;Owolabi et al, 2019;Upadhayaya & Mahajan, 2013;Yamazaki, 2013;Yue et al, 2010;Zhang et al, 2020). Goncharenko and Zhang (2008) reported alternating warming in the lower thermosphere and cooling above 150-km altitude, which was confirmed to be related to the SSW event rather than the seasonal trend, solar flux, or geomagnetic activity.…”

Multiple Technique Observations of the Ionospheric Responses to the 21 June 2020 Solar Eclipse

“…The enhanced eastward electric field should be the main cause for the uplift of the COSMIC profiles in the EIA crests around 70°E. The neutral wind drives the field-aligned drift and induces the interhemispheric transport of the ionospheric F region plasma along the magnetic field lines and affects the EIA distribution in the low latitudes (Zhang et al, 2020). Dang et al (2018) simulated that the EIA northern crest is enhanced due to the transequatorial plasma transport associated with the northward disturbance wind.…”

Prominent Daytime TEC Enhancements Under the Quiescent Condition of January 2017

“…However, these variations in the stratospheric temperature and wind were small, which did not approach the standard definition of SSW (e.g., the temperature typically increases 25 K per week) proposed by Butler et al (2015), although it was referred to as an upper stratospheric warming event by Xiong et al (2018). In addition, the ionospheric changes during SSW reported by previous studies usually had a similar large semidiurnal pattern with a main peak in the morning and a secondary peak in the afternoon (Chau et al, 2012;Zhang et al, 2020). In this study, the prominent daytime TEC changes during this period of interest did not show such a semidiurnal variation (Figures 2a-2b).…”