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Naturally Enhanced Ion-Acoustic Spectra And Their Interpretation

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Abstract

Incoherent scatter radars are designed to detect scatter from thermalfluctuations in the ionosphere. These fluctuations contain, among other things,features associated with ion-acoustic waves driven by random motions within theplasma. The resulting spectra are generally broad and noisy, but neverthelessthe technique can, through a detailed analysis of spectra, be used to measure arange of physical parameters in the Earth's upper atmosphere, and provides apowerful diagnostic in studies of magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling,thermosphere dynamics and the geospace environment in general. In recent yearsthere has been much interest in naturally occurring (as opposed to artificiallystimulated) enhanced ion-acoustic spectra seen in the auroral zone andcusp/cleft region. A study of the plasma instability processes that lead tosuch spectra will help us to better understand auroral particle acceleration,wave-particle and wave-wave interactions in the ionosphere, and theirassociation with magnetospheric processes. There is now a substantial body ofliterature documenting observations of enhanced ion-acoustic spectra, but thereremains controversy over generation mechanisms. We present a review ofliterature documenting observations of naturally enhanced ion-acoustic spectra,observed mainly along the geomagnetic field direction, along with a discussionof the theories put forward to explain such phenomena.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Danish Space Research Institute, Juliane Maries Vej 30, DK-2100, København Ø, Denmark

    Francis Sedgemore-Schulthess

  2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, N6A 3K7, Canada

    Jean-Pierre St. Maurice

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  1. Francis Sedgemore-Schulthess
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Sedgemore-Schulthess, F., St. Maurice, JP. Naturally Enhanced Ion-Acoustic Spectra And Their Interpretation. Surveys in Geophysics 22, 55–92 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1010691026863

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