@Article{Abdu:2016:ElIoWe,
               author = "Abdu, Mangalathayil Ali",
          affiliation = "{Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE)}",
                title = "Electrodynamics of ionospheric weather over low latitudes",
              journal = "Geoscience Letters",
                 year = "2016",
               volume = "3",
               number = "11",
             abstract = "The dynamic state of the ionosphere at low latitudes is largely 
                         controlled by electric fields originating from dynamo actions by 
                         atmospheric waves propagating from below and the solar 
                         wind-magnetosphere interaction from above. These electric fields 
                         cause structuring of the ionosphere in wide ranging spatial and 
                         temporal scales that impact on space-based communication and 
                         navigation systems constituting an important segment of our 
                         technology-based day-to-day lives. The largest of the ionosphere 
                         structures, the equatorial ionization anomaly, with global maximum 
                         of plasma densities can cause propagation delays on the GNSS 
                         signals. The sunset electrodynamics is responsible for the 
                         generation of plasma bubble wide spectrum irregularities that can 
                         cause scintillation or even disruptions of satellite 
                         communication/navigation signals. Driven basically by upward 
                         propagating tides, these electric fields can suffer significant 
                         modulations from perturbation winds due to gravity waves, 
                         planetary/Kelvin waves, and non-migrating tides, as recent 
                         observational and modeling results have demonstrated. The changing 
                         state of the plasma distribution arising from these highly 
                         variable electric fields constitutes an important component of the 
                         ionospheric weather disturbances. Another, often dominating, 
                         component arises from solar disturbances when coronal mass 
                         ejection (CME) interaction with the earths magnetosphere results 
                         in energy transport to low latitudes in the form of storm time 
                         prompt penetration electric fields and thermospheric disturbance 
                         winds. As a result, drastic modifications can occur in the form of 
                         layer restructuring (Es-, F3 layers etc.), large total electron 
                         content (TEC) enhancements, equatorial ionization anomaly (EIA) 
                         latitudinal expansion/contraction, anomalous polarization electric 
                         fields/vertical drifts, enhanced growth/suppression of plasma 
                         structuring, etc. A brief review of our current understanding of 
                         the ionospheric weather variations and the electrodynamic 
                         processes underlying them and some outstanding questions will be 
                         presented in this paper.",
                  doi = "10.1186/s40562-016-0043-6",
                  url = "http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40562-016-0043-6",
                 issn = "2196-4092",
             language = "en",
           targetfile = "abdu_eletrodynamics.pdf",
        urlaccessdate = "27 abr. 2024"
}