A general calculation method to specify center-of-buoyancy for the stratospheric airship with multiple gas cells

As the lighter-than-air (LTA) flight vehicle, the stratospheric airship is a desirable platform to provide communication and surveillance services. During the ascent from sea-level to the mission altitude, the volume of the lifting gas may change significantly, which will result in the change of the center-of-buoyancy (CB). A general calculation method is developed to specify CB for the stratospheric airship with a double-ellipsoid hull and an arbitrary number of the gas cells. The cross-section-integral (CSI) method is used as a basic calculation scenario to specify CB. Considering the complexity in determining the boundary between the helium and air in the gas cell, a searching algorithm is put forward and the specification of CB can be conducted by the iterative calculation. As an important application, the stable condition of the pitch angle is analyzed when the change of CB is involved. Under different initial configurations, the stable pitch angle of the stratospheric airship during the ascent is specified and compared, which shows the advantages of the multi-gas-cell configuration. The results of this paper may provide an important reference for the engineering application of the stratospheric airship.     

Global ionospheric scintillations revealed by GPS radio occultation data with FY3C satellite before midnight during the March 2015 storm

Global observations of S4 amplitude scintillation index by the GPS Occultation Sounder (GNOS) on FengYun-3 C (FY3C) satellite reveal global dynamic patterns of a strong pre-midnight scintillations in F-region of the ionosphere during the St. Patrick’s Day geomagnetic super storm of 17–19 March 2015. The observed strong scintillations mainly occurred in the low latitudes, caused by equatorial plasma bubbles. During the main storm phase (March 17), the scintillations were first triggered in the New Zealand sector near 160°E longitudes, extending beyond 40°S dip latitude. They were also enhanced in the Indian sector, but significantly suppressed in East Asia near 120°E longitude and in Africa around 30°E longitude. During the initial recovery phase (March 18–19), the global scintillations were seldom observed in GNOS data. During the later recovery phase (after March 19), the scintillations recovered to the pre-storm level in Indian, African, and American sectors, but not in East Asian and any of Pacific sectors. These results closely correlate with observations of the density depletion structures by the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System (C/NOFS) satellite, and ground-based instruments. Such consistency indicates reliability of our scintillation sensing approach even in a case-by-case comparison study. The prompt penetration electric field and disturbance dynamo electric field are suggested as the main factors that control the enhancement and inhibition of the scintillations during the storm, respectively.     

Early analysis of precise orbit and clock offset determination for the satellites of the global BeiDou-3 system

Eight new-generation BeiDou satellites (BeiDou-3) have been launched into Medium Earth Orbit (MEO), allowing for global coverage since March 2018, and they are equipped with new hydrogen atomic clocks and updated rubidium clocks. Firstly, we analyzed the signals for the carrier-to-noise-density ratio (C/N0) and pseudorange multipath (MP) by using international GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) Monitoring and Assessment System (iGMAS) station data, and found that B1C has a lower C/N0, and B2a has the same level of C/N0 as the B1I and B3I signals. For pseudorange multipath, compared with the BeiDou-2 satellites, the obvious systematic variation of MP scatters related to the elevation angle is greatly improved for the BeiDou-3 and BeiDou-3e satellites signals. For the signals of the BeiDou-3 satellites, the order of the Root Mean Square (RMS) values of multipath and noise is B3I?<?B1I?<?B2a?<?B1C. Then, the comparison of the precise orbit determination and clock offset determination for the BeiDou-2, BeiDou-3, and BeiDou-3 experimental (BeiDou-3e) satellites was done by using 10 stations from iGMAS. The 3D precision of the 24?h orbit overlap is 24.55, 25.61, and 23.35?cm for the BeiDou-3, BeiDou-3e, and BeiDou-2 satellites, respectively. BeiDou-3 satellite has a comparable precision to that of the BeiDou-2 satellite. For the precision of clock offset estimation, the Standard Deviation (STD) of the BeiDou-3 MEO satellite is 0.350?ns, which is an improvement of 0.042?ns over that of the BeiDou-2 MEO satellite. The stabilities of the BeiDou-3 and BeiDou-3e onboard clocks are better than those of BeiDou-2 by factors of 2.84 and 1.61 at an averaging time of 1000 and 10,000?s, respectively.     

非线性刚度对微机械陀螺动态性能的影响*

为了提高微机械陀螺的稳定性,研究自由振动状态下活动基座上L-L型双质量微机械陀螺的动态性能,建立微机械陀螺的数学模型,得到以幅值-相位为变量的运动微分方程的解,并给出这种解与轨道元素的联系。研究框架质量和弹性件非线性刚度对陀螺漂移量的影响,并给出数值例子。对所得到的解析关系式与曲线进行分析,作出关于系统性能的相应结论。     

Ionospheric F2-Layer critical frequency retrieved from COSMIC radio occultation: A statistical comparison with measurements from a meridional ionosonde chain over Southeast Asia

In this paper, we compared the F2-Layer critical frequency (foF2) derived from FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC radio occultation (RO) and ionosondes at Chiang Mai, Chumphon and Kototabang during the years 2008–2015 to evaluate the performance of COSMIC RO over Southeast Asia region. The results show that the time development of foF2 values derived from COSMIC RO generally agrees well with those from ionosonde measurements. However, the differences between the foF2 derived from COSMIC RO and that derived from ionosonde observations display latitudinal dependence. COSMIC RO tends to underestimate foF2 at Chiang Mai and Kototabang, which is near to the north EIA crest and the south one, respectively, while a little overestimate foF2 at Chumphon, which is close to the geomagnetic equator. COSMIC RO agrees best with ionosonde at Chumphon and worst at Chiang Mai. At each ionosonde station, the quality of COSMIC RO data degrades with the increase of solar activity. In addition, at the station Chiang Mai and Kototabang, COSMIC RO performs better in summer than in equinox and winter. Furthermore, the differences in foF2 derived from COSMIC RO and that from ionosonde measurements vary with local time, i.e., the differences in foF2 are generally smaller at night and larger in noontime when equatorial ionization anomaly (EIA) is well developed.     

Alfvén gravity waves in viscous solar plasma: Effect of the background flow

We study the Propagation and damping properties of Alfvén gravity waves in the presence of the vertical magnetic field in the viscous solar plasma under influence of the background flow by deriving a fourth order dispersion relation in terms of the Doppler shifted frequency. We derive the dispersion relation under WKB and Boussinesq approximation. We study the damping of Alfvén gravity waves for the wave frequencies less than and greater than the Brunt-Väisälä frequency. We find that the Brunt-Väisälä frequency divides the frequency ranges where the weakly or strongly damped oscillations occur. The background flow exhibits a strong effect on weakly damped oscillations and a weak effect on the strongly damped oscillations. We also notice that the damping of both the strong and weakly damped oscillations depend on the Brunt-Väisälä frequency and wave number. The effect of the background flow is also being governed by the Brunt-Väisälä frequency and wave number. We also study the properties of gravity wave mode after filtering the Alfvén wave mode by minimizing the magnetic field and noticed that the background flow shows a very strong effect on the gravity wave mode.     

Generalised variational assimilation of cloud-affected brightness temperature using simulated hyper-spectral atmospheric infrared sounder data

Assimilated channel brightness temperature data from infrared sounders accounting for cloud effects have a positive effect on weather forecasting, especially in weather-sensitive areas. When cloud effects are included, the channel brightness temperature deviations follow a non-Gaussian distribution. However, classical variational data assimilation follows a Gaussian distribution. When processing the cloud-affected brightness temperature, useful data are lost through the cloud detection process, thus assimilating some channel brightness temperatures with weight function peaks above the cloud top. Furthermore, strict quality control of brightness temperature removes outliers. By adopting the generalised variational assimilation method, which assumes that errors follow a non-Gaussian distribution, this paper assimilates the cloud-affected brightness temperature using simulated data for the hyper-spectral atmospheric infrared sounder (AIRS). A channel set is formed by dynamically selecting AIRS channels. The experiments for retrieving temperature and humidity data demonstrate that the generalised variational assimilated cloud-affected brightness temperature method performs better than the classical method.     

A regional tropospheric model for airborne GPS applications

A regional tropospheric model can be constructed using surveys from GPS ground networks. Using this model the tropospheric delays of a kinematic station within the region can be interpolated. However, such a model is generally not suitable for an airborne platform high above the ground networks. In this paper, a method of constructing a regional tropospheric model for airborne GPS applications is described. First, the kinematic station in the air is projected onto the ground. Then the tropospheric delays at projected point are interpolated from those of the ground networks. Finally, the tropospheric delays at projected point are extended upward to the airborne platform using pressure and temperature gradients and humidity exponential function. For validation of this method, the data of airborne campaign carried out by BKG in cooperation with GFZ and BGR 2008 in the northern Alps are used. The results show that GPS kinematic positioning precision in height component can be improved using this method.     

Genetic differentiation induced by spaceflight treatment of Cistanche deserticola and identification of inter-simple sequence repeat markers associated with its medicinal constituent contents

The dried, fleshy stems of Cistanche deserticola (Orobanchaceae) are popular tonics in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to treat the inability of kidney in expelling extra fluid in the body, causing fluid retention, and reform reproductive system. However, the wild plants of C. deserticola have become endangered due to habitat downsizing and over-harvesting for its medicinal usages. The present research was carried out for the following purposes: (1) promoting the space-breeding research; (2) providing molecular evidence for agricultural selective breeding; and (3) protecting this endangered herbal medicine and conserving its genetic resources.