Long-Term Observation of the Quasi-3-Hour Large-Scale Traveling Ionospheric Disturbances by the Oblique-Incidence Ionosonde Network in North China.

The oblique-incidence ionosonde network in North China is a very unique system for regional ionospheric observation. It contains 5 transmitters and 20 receivers, and it has 99 ionospheric observation points between 22.40° N and 33.19° N geomagnetic latitudes. The data of the ionosonde network were used to investigate the statistical characteristics of the quasi-3-h large-scale traveling ionospheric disturbances (LSTIDs). From September 2009 to August 2011, 157 cases of the quiet-time LSTIDs were recorded; 110 cases traveled southward, 46 cases traveled southwestward and only 1 case traveled southeastward. The LSTIDs mainly appeared between 10:00 and 19:00 LT in the months from September to the following May. We compared the data of the Beijing, Mohe and Yakutsk digisondes and found that the LSTIDs are most likely to come from the northern auroral region. These LSTIDs may be induced by the atmospheric gravity waves (AGWs) and presented obvious seasonal and diurnal varying features, indicating that the thermospheric wind field has played an important role.

Design and Application of Wuhan Ionospheric Oblique Backscattering Sounding System with the Addition of an Antenna Array (WIOBSS-AA).

The Wuhan Ionospheric Oblique Backscattering Sounding System with the addition of an antenna array (WIOBSS-AA) is the newest member of the WIOBSS family. It is a multi-channel radio system using phased-array antenna technology. The transmitting part of this radio system applies an array composed of five log-periodic antennas to form five beams that span an area to the northwest of the radar site. The hardware and the antenna array of the first multi-channel ionosonde in the WIOBSS family are introduced in detail in this paper. An ionospheric detection experiment was carried out in Chongyang, Hubei province, China on 16 March 2015 to examine the performance of WIOBSS-AA. The radio system demonstrated its ability to obtain ionospheric electron density information over a wide area. The observations indicate that during the experiment, the monitored large-area ionospheric F2-layer was calm and electron density increased with decreasing latitude.