Description
The understanding of the impact of solar activity on polar regions
upper atmosphere is not as strong as compare to low and mid-latitudes
due to lack of experimental observations, especially over Antarctica.
To characterize the differences in the ionosphere-plasmasphere total
electron content (TEC) climatological patterns over Antarctica, we
reprocessed the GNSS (GPS + GLONASS) data available since 1999 up to
now for stations situated at latitudes below S50°. For that, we used
the data from POLENET/IGS networks and stations installed around the
Princess Elisabeth polar Base (Utsteinen, North-East Antarctica).
The estimated TEC data set is then employed to constrain an empirical
model to predict the TEC from F10.7P solar index in entrance using a
least-square adjustment. To minimize the differences between the
modelled and observed vTEC we considered: (1) an eight-order
polynomial function with monthly coefficients between the TEC and
F10.7P; (2) a discretization with respect to different zones over
Antarctica region to highlight different climatological patterns; (3)
different time definitions such as Solar Local Time, Magnetic Local
Time, and UTC.
From the output of this model we discuss the different climatological
behaviors identified in the ionosphere-
plasmasphere TEC at these high latitudes. Finally, we show some
examples of typical TEC disturbances observed during extreme solar
events.
Primary author
Dr
Nicolas Bergeot
(Royal Observatory of Belgium)
Co-author
Mr
Jean-Marie Chevalier
(Royal Observatory of Belgium)
