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GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 28, NO. 24, PAGES 4517–4520, 2001

An Investigation of Motions of the Equatorial Anomaly Crest

K. C. Yeh

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign


S. J. Franke

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign


E. S. Andreeva

Department of Physics, M. Lomonosov Moscow State University


V. E. Kunitsyn

Department of Physics, M. Lomonosov Moscow State University


Abstract

Using more than 350 ionospheric images reconstructed tomographically, studies on the motion of the anomaly crest and its geophysical implications are carried out. On an average day, the crest forms at 09:00 LT and, in the next two hours, moves poleward with a speed of about 1° per hour as it intensifies. This poleward motion is slowed as the crest reaches its highest latitude where it stays for several hours until early afternoon. Thereafter, the crest starts to weaken as it recedes with a speed of about 0.5° per hour equatorward. During 12:00 - 14:00 LT, the crest latitude is found to correlate with the fountain strength and the total number of electrons in a cross sectional plane at the observational longitude of the whole equatorial ionosphere.

Received 6 August 2001; accepted 4 October 2001.

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Citation: Yeh, K. C., S. J. Franke, E. S. Andreeva, and V. E. Kunitsyn (2001), An Investigation of Motions of the Equatorial Anomaly Crest, Geophys. Res. Lett., 28(24), 4517–4520.