Devin Huyghebaert (IAP) Investigating the Mesosphere and Lower Thermosphere with Meteor Head Echoes

Devin Huyghebaert (IAP) wird auf unserem IAP-Kolloquium einen Vortrag zum Thema "Investigating the Mesosphere and Lower Thermosphere with Meteor Head Echoes" halten.

Zusammenfassung:

As the Earth orbits the sun, dust and meteoroids in the path are captured by the Earth's gravity and "fall" into the atmosphere.  The relative speed of this matter with respect to the Earth can be up to 72~km/s and results in intense frictional heating when travelling through the atmosphere at altitudes below 130~km.  The heating and subsequent ablation of the material in the atmosphere is what is referred to as a ``meteor".  If there is material that survives the ablation process and reaches the surface, it is known as a "meteorite".  The Middle Atmosphere Alomar Radar System (MAARSY) is able to detect and track the high density plasma in the vicinity of ablating meteors, known as meteor head echoes.  The density of the atmosphere affects the meteor ablation process and the trajectory.  We can therefore use the characteristics of a population of meteor head echoes as a tracer of changes to the atmospheric density at these altitudes.  An overview of recent work will be highlighted that involves investigating the atmospheric mean-free path effect on meteor head echoes, tracking neutral density variations between years using changes to meteor head echo population characteristics for the same day-of-year, and the expansion of continuous meteor head echo monitoring to the PANSY radar system in Antarctica.