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A case study on occurrence of an unusual structure in the sodium layer over Gadanki, India

Cited 7 time in wos
Cited 9 time in scopus
Title
A case study on occurrence of an unusual structure in the sodium layer over Gadanki, India
Authors
Sarkhel, Sumanta
Mathews, John D.
Raizada, Shikha
Sekar, Ramanathan
Chakrabarty, Dibyendu
Guharay, Amitava
Jee, Geonhwa
Kim, Jeong-Han
Kerr, Robert B.
Ramkumar, Geetha
Sridharan, Sundararajan
Wu, Qian
Mlynczak, Martin G.
Russell, James M. III
Subject
Geology
Keywords
Lidar observationSodium layer
Issue Date
2015
Citation
Sarkhel, Sumanta, et al. 2015. "A case study on occurrence of an unusual structure in the sodium layer over Gadanki, India". Earth, Planets and Space, 67(19): 1-15.
Abstract
The height-time-concentration map of neutral sodium (Na) atoms measured by a Na lidar during the night of 18 to 19 March 2007 over Gadanki, India (13.5° N, 79.2° E) reveals an unusual structure in the Na layer for around 30 min in the altitude range of 92 to 98 km which is similar to the usual 'C' type structures observed at other locations. In order to understand the physical mechanism behind the generation of this unusual event, an investigation is carried out combining the data from multiple instruments that include the meteor wind radar over Thiruvananthapuram, India (8.5° N, 77° E) and the SABER instrument onboard the TIMED satellite. The temperature and wind profiles from the data set provided by these instruments allow us to infer the Richardson number which is found to be noticeably less than the canonical threshold of 0.25 above 92 km over Thiruvananthapuram suggesting the plausible generation of Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) billows over southwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. Based on the average wind speed and direction over Thiruvananthapuram, it is proposed that the KH-billow structure was modified due to the background wind and was advected with it in nearly 'frozen-in' condition (without significant decay) in the northeastward direction reaching the Na lidar location (Gadanki). This case study, therefore, presents a scenario wherein the initially deformed KH-billow structure survived for a few hours (instead of a few minutes or tens of minutes as reported in earlier works) in an apparently 'frozen-in' condition under favorable background conditions. In this communication, we suggest a hypothesis where this deformed KH-billow structure plays crucial role in creating the abovementioned unusual structure observed in the Na layer over Gadanki.
DOI
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40623-015-0183-5
Type
Article
Appears in Collections  
2014-2016, Investigation of Climate Change Mechanism by Observation and Simulation of Polar Climate for The Past and Present (14-16) / Kim, Seong-Joong (PE14010; PE15010; PE16010)
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