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Global distribution of pauses observed with satellite measurements

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Several studies have been carried out on the tropopause, stratopause, and mesopause (collectively termed as ‘pauses’) independently; however, all the pauses have not been studied together. We present global distribution of altitudes and temperatures of these pauses observed with long-term space borne high-resolution measurements of Global Positioning System (GPS) Radio Occultation (RO) and Sounding of the Atmosphere using Broadband Emission Radiometry (SABER) aboard Thermosphere-Ionosphere-Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics (TIMED) satellite. Here we study the commonality and differences observed in the variability of all the pauses. We also examined how good other datasets will represent these features among (and in between) different satellite measurements, re-analysis, and model data. Hemispheric differences observed in all the pauses are also reported. In addition, we show that asymmetries between northern and southern hemispheres continue up to the mesopause. We analyze inter and intra-seasonal variations and long-term trends of these pauses at different latitudes. Finally, a new reference temperature profile is shown from the ground to 110 km for tropical, mid-latitudes, and polar latitudes for both northern and southern hemispheres.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank UCAR and SABER team for providing the dataset through their ftp sites. They also thank all other data sources for providing data through their ftp sites. They are grateful to Prof. B V Krishna Murthy for helping them in improving the paper by fruitful discussions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Atmospheric Research Laboratory, Gadanki, Tirupati 517 502, India

    M VENKAT RATNAM

  2. Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, CA, 92697, USA

    P KISHORE & ISABELLA VELICOGNA

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  1. M VENKAT RATNAM
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Correspondence to M VENKAT RATNAM.

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RATNAM, M.V., KISHORE, P. & VELICOGNA, I. Global distribution of pauses observed with satellite measurements. J Earth Syst Sci 122, 515–529 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-013-0278-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-013-0278-y

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