Highly-Relativistic Electrons in the Mesosphere

At the request and with the support of Dr. Richard A. Goldberg of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Nomad Research developed data analysis routines to study the variations of ozone (O3) in the mesosphere and highly-relativistic electrons in the radiation belts. We used data from several instruments on the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS), combining ozone mixing ratio data from MLS, CLAES, and HRDI with electron fluxes from the High Energy Electron Spectrometers (HEPS). The primary goal of this project was to determine whether the electrons could cause chemical changes in the the mesosphere, using ozone as the probe of the local chemistry.

Measurements of ozone within the geographic region irradiated by the electrons (magnetic latitudes between 55° and 60°) were extracted from the CDHF database. Fortran and IDL programs were then used to analyze and plot the data in various ways. The most useful analysis was to order the data in local solar time and look for deviations from the diurnal cycle.

Results of the analysis have been presented at meetings of the American Geophysical Union and the 1997 CEDAR Workshops.
A paper discussing these results appeared in the Journal of Geophysical Research, 104, 165-176, 1999.
The data discussed at the 2001 NSREC are available here.

Calculate the TIMED day

Below are examples of the electron flux that affects the atmosphere (precipitating) and spacecraft (trapped).



HEPS Integrated Precipitating Flux