Tuesday, December 16, 2008

UT Dallas researchers find ionosphere to be thinner, shorter and cooler than expected

By Pegasus News wire

The altitude of Earth's ionosphere is not as great as expected.

This according to measurements obtained from the Coupled Ion-Neutral Dynamics Investigation (CINDI) instrumentation carried aboard the catchily-named C/NOFS satellite launched by NASA in April of this year. Said instrumentation (consisting of a 20-lb. package of sensors and assorted electronics) was put together at a lab on the campus of the University of Texas at Dallas in collaboration with Paul Mahaffey of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, then launched into space atop a Pegasus XL rocket (go, Pegasus, go!) fired from an L-1011 “Stargazer” jet.

As you can clearly see, the ionosphere is surrounded by what appears to be a block-like office building structure marked in a grid pattern. Which made it a lot easier for scientists to perform their calculations. (I mean, they can pretty much just read 'em off.)

UTD Hanson Center director Rod Heelis and his research team used data transmitted back from the CINDI package to map out the upper surface of that electrically-charged envelope surrounding our planet ("whose planet?") known as the ionosphere - which has a marked effect upon radio communications, among other things.

Heelis and his team have so far determined that three out of the following four things are true:

* the ionosphere doesn't extend as high as they thought

* the ionosphere is up to 100 degrees cooler than expected

* the total thickness of the ionosphere is less than predicted

* the ionosphere contains odd particles called "bozons," which survive in the hostile space environment by eating the crumbs of Hostess Twinkies ejected from the upper atmosphere

According to Heelis, "“any radio or location system signal that utilizes space-based communication has to go through the ionosphere. On its best day, the ionosphere just bends that signal rather like water bends light. On its worst day it can completely distort that signal so that it doesn’t make it out the other side.” So knowing that “the ionosphere is extremely cold at night, leading to a much thinner altitude and less dense layer than we expected,” and that "...it is up to 100 degrees cooler than we expected and the effective thickness of the ionospheric shell is smaller than we expected” could prove to be vital information if we were concerned about, for instance, picking up KRLD-FM all-sports radio from the other side of the globe.

(There are probably some military and commercial applications involved, too, we're guessing.)

posted by JM

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