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The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling
The meteoric metal layers act as unique tracers of chemistry and dynamics in the upper atmosphere. Existing lidar studies from a few locations show that K exhibits a semiannual seasonality (winter and summer maxima), quite unlike the annual seasonality (winter maximum and summer minimum) seen with N...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
John Wiley and Sons Inc.
2015
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4949710/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27478716 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2015JD023212 |
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author | Dawkins, E. C. M. Plane, J. M. C. Chipperfield, M. P. Feng, W. |
author_facet | Dawkins, E. C. M. Plane, J. M. C. Chipperfield, M. P. Feng, W. |
author_sort | Dawkins, E. C. M. |
collection | PubMed |
description | The meteoric metal layers act as unique tracers of chemistry and dynamics in the upper atmosphere. Existing lidar studies from a few locations show that K exhibits a semiannual seasonality (winter and summer maxima), quite unlike the annual seasonality (winter maximum and summer minimum) seen with Na and Fe. This work uses spaceborne observations made with the Optical Spectrograph and InfraRed Imager System instrument on the Odin satellite to retrieve the near‐global K layer for the first time. The satellite data (2004 to mid‐2013) are used to validate the implementation of a recently proposed potassium chemistry scheme in a whole atmosphere chemistry climate model, which provides a chemical basis for this semiannual seasonal behavior. The satellite and model data show that this semiannual seasonality is near global in extent, with the strongest variation at middle and high latitudes. The column abundance, centroid layer height, and root‐mean‐square width of the K layer are consistent with the limited available lidar record. The K data set is then used to investigate the impact of polar mesospheric clouds on the metal layers at high latitudes during summer. Finally, the occurrence frequency of sporadic K layers and their possible link to sporadic E layers are examined. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4949710 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2015 |
publisher | John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-49497102016-07-28 The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling Dawkins, E. C. M. Plane, J. M. C. Chipperfield, M. P. Feng, W. J Geophys Res Atmos Research Articles The meteoric metal layers act as unique tracers of chemistry and dynamics in the upper atmosphere. Existing lidar studies from a few locations show that K exhibits a semiannual seasonality (winter and summer maxima), quite unlike the annual seasonality (winter maximum and summer minimum) seen with Na and Fe. This work uses spaceborne observations made with the Optical Spectrograph and InfraRed Imager System instrument on the Odin satellite to retrieve the near‐global K layer for the first time. The satellite data (2004 to mid‐2013) are used to validate the implementation of a recently proposed potassium chemistry scheme in a whole atmosphere chemistry climate model, which provides a chemical basis for this semiannual seasonal behavior. The satellite and model data show that this semiannual seasonality is near global in extent, with the strongest variation at middle and high latitudes. The column abundance, centroid layer height, and root‐mean‐square width of the K layer are consistent with the limited available lidar record. The K data set is then used to investigate the impact of polar mesospheric clouds on the metal layers at high latitudes during summer. Finally, the occurrence frequency of sporadic K layers and their possible link to sporadic E layers are examined. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2015-08-16 2015-08-07 /pmc/articles/PMC4949710/ /pubmed/27478716 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2015JD023212 Text en ©2015. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Research Articles Dawkins, E. C. M. Plane, J. M. C. Chipperfield, M. P. Feng, W. The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title | The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title_full | The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title_fullStr | The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title_full_unstemmed | The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title_short | The near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: Observations and modeling |
title_sort | near‐global mesospheric potassium layer: observations and modeling |
topic | Research Articles |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4949710/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27478716 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2015JD023212 |
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