Identification

Title

An explanation for Arecibo plasma line power striations

Abstract

Measurements of plasma lines by the Arecibo incoherent scatter radar are known to have sharp striations in power, varying with the plasma frequency and magnetic aspect angle of the radar beam. We explain these power striations as the manifestation of a suprathermal electron population with peaks in energy at approximately 15, 25, and 45 eV. These energies correspond to sharp features in the photoelectron energy spectra measured by rockets and spacecraft. A new theory is developed to predict the plasma line power for an arbitrary, magnetized suprathermal distribution. The magnetization terms in this theory are shown to contribute substantially to the enhancement of plasma line power through inverse Landau and cyclotron damping of the suprathermal peaks. The theory is applied as a forward model to measurements obtained at Arecibo for different magnetic field aspect angles, showing general agreement with the data. At large magnetic aspect angles the theory reproduces the upper-hybrid instability which can cause 150 km echoes. The developed theory allows for the suprathermal distribution at a given altitude to be probed across a wide range of energies and pitch angles.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7x06bfr

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2021-02-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact