廊坊中频雷达流星观测及初步结果

中频雷达用来开展夜间100km高度以上的流星观测,获得流星随时间、高度、方位的分布情况及流星体速度、流星辐射点、流星余迹径向速度等参数,其探测数据可用于流星天文学、中层大气动力学等领域的研究.利用2017年11月16日12:00UT-22:00UT期间廊坊观测站（39.4°N,116.7°E）的中频雷达数据,首次开展了中国中纬度地区夜间流星观测实验,共检测到94个流星回波信号,集中分布在97～115km高度范围内,平均高度为106.5km,计算得到了流星回波的双极扩散系数、方位分布等相关参数,并与国外中频雷达流星探测结果进行了初步比较.      

流星参数的数值分析和流星高度分布模型

流星余迹能够被后向散射雷达观测到, 利用观测结果, 可以分析和研究流星的空间分布和时间变化规律. 同时, 利用流星空间分布还可以进行空间碎片的研究. 基于标准理论, 对影响雷达回波功率的主要因素, 例如如双极扩散、余迹的初始半径、流星的有限速度, 以及雷达的脉冲重复频率在不同频率和速度下进行了数值分析和计算, 得到的流星衰减时间及双极扩散系数的观测结果与理论结果一致. 通过对昆明流星雷 达观测到的571632个流星进行统计分析, 得到了流星高度分布统计模型, 并利用该模型的分析结果与不同月份流星的观测数据进行对比, 结果比较一致.      

长时间流星不均匀体母体特征个例研究

流星体坠入地球大气烧蚀电离产生流星等离子体尾迹,在等离子体不稳定性过程作用下产生流星不均匀体.利用光学视频和无线电雷达在低纬三亚开展流星体烧蚀和流星不均匀体综合探测结果,发展了一种获取流星不均匀体母体（流星体）特征参数的方法,并对2015年12月双子座流星雨期间观测的一次长持续时间流星不均匀体事例进行了分析,得到了其母体速度、质量和轨道等特征,结果显示产生这次流星不均匀体的流星体速度和轨道等具有双子座流星特点.该方法可应用于流星不均匀体及其母体特征研究.      

流星雷达系统相位差偏差的估计和校正

介绍了一种新的流星雷达系统的相位偏差估计和校正方法.利用流星回波的观测数据,用回波信号在各个接收通道之间的相位差,结合干涉式接收天线阵的几何关系,建立了各天线相位差测量值与偏差值之间的线性方程组,利用最小二乘法求解方程组,得到了流星雷达系统各个接收通道之间的相位差偏差估计值及校正后的流星回波到达角.与已有的流星雷达相位偏差估计和校正的方法相比,这种方法可以通过流星雷达的观测数据来计破算雷达系统各个接收天线通道之间的相位差偏差量,而不需要增加额外的硬件,实现了对观测数据的事后处理,可以方便地对已有数据进行校正.以2004年4-6月的武汉流星雷达观测数据为例,计算了流星雷达系统的偏差估计量,并用校正后的数据来计算流星回波的空间位置.结果表明,校正后流星回波数在各个方向上随高度的分布比校正前更符合统计分布.      

武汉上空偶发E层与流星雨的联系

利用全天空流星雷达和数字测高仪联合观测数据,初步分析了武汉(30°32′N,114°22′E)上空2002年3次大的流星雨(英仙座、狮子座、双子座)及2003年象限座流星雨爆发期间Es的出现率变化趋势及其与流星观测量的关系.结果表明,在流星雨爆发时,雷达观测到的流星数目会显著增加;流星雨峰值过后,Es出现率也会增大.流星数和Es出现率间的平均互相关函数有两个峰值,第一个峰值平均出现在流星雨爆发后的第2天前后,第二个峰值平均出现在流星雨后第6天前后.我们认为,第一个峰值对应于流星雨期间的大量流星雨电离产生的Es,第二个峰值对应于流星雨后沉积的金属离子在风剪切作用下形成的Es.     

全天空流星雷达相位差监测分析方法研究

介绍了一种直接利用流星观测数据, 根据流星的时空分布特性和天线的空间布阵关系建立数学模型, 对全天空流星雷达各天线通道的相位差进行监测分析和估算的新方法. 通过分析全天空流星雷达的流星观测数据, 获得了流星时空分布特性, 天线阵相位差变化对流星空间分布的影响, 特别是流星高度分布的标准差特性与各天线相位差的关系. 在此基础上, 模拟研究了利用流星高度分布的标准差来估算天线相位差的偏差, 并应用于中国三亚地区全天空流星雷达进行相位差监测分析和校正. 结果表明, 新方法无需任何附加硬件, 通过日常观测数据就能对某一通道的相位差变化或多个通道的相位差变化进行估算和分析,相位差监测精度优于2°. 对这些相位差变化进行校正, 可有效提高全天空流星雷达对流星的定位测量精度.      

你"误会"流星了吗?

斗转星移,就在人们仍多少沉浸于2001年狮子座流星雨的回味与遐想之中时,日历已经翻到了2002年的下半年。基于计数观测,天文工作者发现:在一年中,下半年的流星总是比上半年的多。于是,进入下半年也就意味着观赏流星和流星雨的季节又到来了。但是对于流星这种古怪灵精的小东西,你了解它多少呢?其实有不少人都对它持有形形色色的错误认识呢。快看一看,你是否也曾经“误会”了流星?     

美丽的流星秀

1999年的狮子座流星雨,正如天文学家预测的那样,于格林尼治时间11月18日凌晨2:00～2:10之间达到极大。这次流星雨最佳的观看地点分布于北非、欧洲和中东一带,其他地区虽然也可以观测到,景观却难以比拟。不过,基本上整个北半球都可以欣赏到这次宇宙烟花表演。     

流星突发通信信道日变化预测模型

流星突发通信不同于传统的通信, 其是低速率通信, 具有突发、不连续、不定时的特性. 因此, 流星余迹通信的复杂性要求有必要对其通信信道进行建模. 在流星通信链路中, 流星的辐射分布、可用流星率和占空比是影响流星通信信道性能的重要参数. 流星辐射分布在不同季节不同时间都各不相同, 因此准确预测流星通信链路在不同时间的流星辐射分布, 从而改变大圆路径上天线的指向, 对提高通信速率显得非常重要. 同时, 准确预测流星突发通信链路上的可用流星率和占空比, 有助于准确预测并建立流星突发信道模型. 本文分析研究了偶发流星辐射分布建模的发展, 建立了偶发流星日心空间和地心空间的几何关系, 得到了流星突发通信信道参数预测模型. 并将预测模型应用于流星通信链路, 预测结果与通信链路观测结果比较一致, 为流星通信系统的建立提供了技术支持.      

Shoemaker—Levy9彗星撞击木星的流星物理学

本文从流星物理学的基本方程出发，导出Ｓｈｏｅｍａｋｅｒ－Ｌｅｖｙ９彗星撞击木星时的速度、质量损失、电子线密度、能量释放率随高度的分布公式；采用合理的参数，作了一系列计算，并与观测资料比较，进行一些讨论。     

Antarctic meteor observations using the Davis MST and meteor radars

This paper presents the meteor observations obtained using two radars installed at Davis (68.6°S, 78.0°E), Antarctica. The Davis MST radar was installed primarily for observation of polar mesosphere summer echoes, with additional transmit and receive antennas installed to allow all-sky interferometric meteor radar observations. The Davis meteor radar performs dedicated all-sky interferometric meteor radar observations. The annual count rate variation for both radars peaks in mid-summer and minimizes in early Spring. The height distribution shows significant annual variation, with minimum (maximum) peak heights and maximum (minimum) height widths in early Spring (mid-summer). Although the meteor radar count rate and height distribution variations are consistent with a similar frequency meteor radar operating at Andenes (69.3°N), the peak heights show a much larger variation than at Andenes, while the count rate maximum-to-minimum ratios show a much smaller variation. Investigation of the effects of the temporal sampling parameters suggests that these differences are consistent with the different temporal sampling strategies used by the Davis and Andenes meteor radars. The new radiant mapping procedure of [Jones, J., Jones, W., Meteor radiant activity mapping using single-station radar observations, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 367(3), 1050–1056, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2006.10025.x, 2006] is investigated. The technique is used to detect the Southern delta-Aquarid meteor shower, and a previously unknown weak shower. Meteoroid speeds obtained using the Fresnel transform are presented. The diurnal, annual, and height variation of meteoroid speeds are presented, with the results found to be consistent with those obtained using specular meteor radars. Meteoroid speed estimates for echoes identified as Southern delta-Aquarid and Sextantid meteor candidates show good agreement with the theoretical pre-atmospheric speeds of these showers (41 km s⁻¹ and 32 km s⁻¹, respectively). The meteoroid speeds estimated for these showers show decreasing speed with decreasing height, consistent with the effects of meteoroid deceleration. Finally, we illustrate how the new radiant mapping and meteoroid speed techniques can be combined for unambiguous meteor shower detection, and use these techniques to detect a previously unknown weak shower.     

Seasonal variations in vertical distribution of meteor decay time as observed from meteor radars at 8.5°N and 80°N

The decay times of meteor radar echoes have been used for decades to investigate characteristics of the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT) region. As the meteor echo decay time depends on background atmospheric parameters, in the present communication, we examine the seasonal variation of the vertical distributions of underdense meteor echo decay times with respect to echo strength. Observations from two similar radars located at two distinct geographical locations, Thumba (8.5°N, 77°E) and Eureka (80°N, 85.8°W) were used for the present study. Here, the radar received signal power is categorized into strong and weak echoes and vertical profiles of their decay times are constructed. It has been noticed that the monthly mean decay time vertical profile turning altitude (i.e., inflection point) varies in the range of 80–87?km of altitude depending on latitude. The turning altitude is observed at relatively lower heights in the winter than in summer at both the latitudes. The present analysis shows that the meteor decay time below the mean turning altitude follows a decreasing trend with decreasing altitude, which is quite distinct to the behaviour of ambipolar diffusion. It is also observed that there is a difference in mean decay time of strong and weak echoes below 90?km of altitude, which is very prominently seen at lower altitudes. This difference shows a seasonal pattern at high latitude, but does not show any seasonal variation at low latitude. The present results are discussed in light of current understanding of the meteor decay time.     

Plasma and electromagnetic wave simulations of meteors

Every day billions of meteoroids impact and disintegrate in the Earth’s atmosphere. Current estimates for this global meteor flux vary from 2000 to 200,000 tons per year, and estimates for the average velocity range between 10 km/s and 70 km/s. The basic properties of this global meteor flux, such as the average mass, velocity, and chemical composition remain poorly constrained. We believe much of the mystery surrounding the basic parameters of the interplanetary meteor flux exists for the following reason, the unknown sampling characteristics of different radar meteor observation techniques, which are used to derive or constrain most models. We believe this arises due to poorly understood radio scattering characteristics of the meteor plasma, especially in light of recent work showing that plasma turbulence and instability greatly influences meteor trail properties at every stage of evolution. We present our results on meteor plasmas simulations of head echoes using particle in cell (PIC) ions, which show that electric fields strongly influence early stage meteor plasma evolution, by accelerating ions away from the meteoroid body. We also present the results of finite difference time domain electromagnetic simulations (FDTD), which can calculate the radar cross section of the simulated meteor plasmas. These simulations have shown that the radar cross section depends in a complex manner on a number of parameters. These include the angle between radar and meteor entry, a large dependence on radar frequency, which shows that for a given meteor plasma size and density, the reflectivity as a function of probing radar frequency varies, but typically peaks below 100 MHz.     

Meteor radar temperatures over Collm (51.3°N, 13°E)

The method of obtaining absolute temperature estimates by measuring the ambipolar diffusion coefficient with meteor radars in the mesopause region is basically well known. However, there is still a need to refine and adjust the background temperature gradient model which is necessary to calculate the temperature values. Therefore, a detailed comparison with independent temperature measurements is necessary to evaluate the performance of the method and to obtain more information about the temperature gradient. Recent studies provide some evidence that the impact of the gradient model on temperature estimates affects the absolute temperatures, but that it is of minor importance for wave analysis. This paper focuses on a detailed evaluation of the meteor radar temperatures by comparing them with SABER satellite and OH-emission mesopause region temperatures. The seasonal variation of the observed temperatures is well reproduced by the COMMA general circulation model.     

An intercomparison of meteor radar measurements at the South Pole using two different processing systems

A new meteor radar system was installed at the Amundsen–Scott station South Pole in 2001 to further the understanding of the dynamics of the Antarctic region. The antenna array consists of four yagis pointed along the 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° meridians and five folded crossed dipoles arranged in a cross configuration and operating as an interferometer to provide position measurements for the detected radio meteors. The four yagis are time division multiplexed and used for both transmitting and receiving while the five folded crossed dipoles are only used for reception. The current arrangement of data acquisition (DAQ) systems at the South Pole allows the collection of meteors in a configuration similar to the previous meteor radar system that operated at the South Pole in the mid 1990s while also using an interferometer to accurately determine the meteor positions in the sky, which enables the determination of the vertical structure of the observed waves. This has been accomplished through the use of two DAQ and post-processing systems: COBRA (Colorado Obninsk radar) connected to the yagis and MEDAC (meteor echo detection and collection) connected to the folded crossed dipoles. With two separate DAQ systems operating in parallel we have the ability to directly compare the results and understand the inherent variability in the derived scientific results based on different system architectures and processing assumptions. The impact of operating a system without an interferometer on the amplitudes and phases of the observed wave components is considered. We find that the lack of altitude resolution of the COBRA DAQ system leads to an underestimation of the amplitude of the s = 1 component of the semidiurnal tide of ∼20% during the summer months.