A regional model for the prediction of M(3000)F2 over East Asia

Research on empirical or physical models of ionospheric parameters is one of the important topics in the field of space weather and communication support services. To improve the accuracy of predicting the monthly median ionospheric propagating factor at 3000 km of the F2 layer (identified as M(3000)F2) for high frequency radio wave propagation, a model based on modified orthogonal temporal–spatial functions is proposed. The proposed model has three new characteristics: (1) The solar activity parameters of sunspot number and the 10.7-cm solar radio flux are together introduced into temporal reconstruction. (2) Both the geomagnetic dip and its modified value are chosen as features of the geographical spatial variation for spatial reconstruction. (3) A series of harmonic functions are used to represent the M(3000)F2, which reflects seasonal and solar cycle variations. The proposed model is established by combining nonlinear regression for three characteristics with harmonic analysis by using vertical sounding data over East Asia. Statistical results reveal that M(3000)F2 calculated by the proposed model is consistent with the trend of the monthly median observations. The proposed model is better than the International Reference Ionosphere (IRI) model by comparison between predictions and observations of six station, which illustrates that the proposed model outperforms the IRI model over East Asia. The proposed method can be further expanded for potentially providing more accurate predictions for other ionospheric parameters on the global scale.