Modeling of response of the thermosphere-ionosphere system to sudden stratospheric warmings of years 2008 and 2009

A study of the response of the thermosphere and ionosphere to sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs) which occurred in January of 2008 and 2009 is presented. The Global Self-consistent Model of the Thermosphere, Ionosphere, and Protonosphere (GSM TIP) developed in the West Department of IZMIRAN was a theoretical basis for this study. A comparison of the simulation results of the thermosphere-ionosphere response to SSW events with the observational data over Irkutsk and also with theoretical and experimental studies carried out during the recent years is performed. SSW events were modeled by setting disturbances in the neutral temperature and density at the lower boundary of the GSM TIP model (80 km above the Earth’s surface). It is shown that the disturbances related to SSW lead to substantial global effects in the thermosphere and ionosphere. The analysis of the experimental data showed that, in spite of very similar solar and geophysical conditions on the background of which two considered stratospheric warming events happened, the occurring disturbances in temperature at heights of the mesosphere and lower thermosphere differ substantially from each other, although some common regularities still take place especially at heights of the ionospheric F region.