CEDAR Post-Doc: The Electron Energy Balance over Millstone Hill Using Combined Optical and Incoherent Scatter Measurements

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This post-doctoral grant examines the thermal balance of ionospheric electrons through combining optical and incoherent scatter measurements. He will accomplish measurements with ground-based observations that utilize CEDAR developed instrumentation at Millstone Hill Observatory. Optical measurements supplement the ongoing CEDAR NETE campaign, and are designed to provide conjugate hemisphere photoelectron flux information. This flux of photoelectrons is the heat source for thermal electrons in the nighttime ionosphere. Hence, optical measurements of the conjugate hemisphere photoelectron flux will provide an important constraint for the radar investigation of ionospheric behavior. In addition, he will perform a modeling study of mechanisms responsible for enhanced nighttime electron temperature and densities over Millstone Hill. The Field Line Interhemispheric Plasma (FLIP) model calculates plasma density and temperature above 80 km from one hemisphere to another. One aspect of the modeling to be addressed is plasmaspheric heating through pitch angle trapping of ionospheric electrons, which is estimated by assuming a fraction of the photoelectrons trapped in the plasmasphere depositing a whole of their energy there. Ongoing radar measurements coupled with the proposed ground-based optical measurements of photoelectron flux will constrain this estimate of the fraction of photoelectrons trapped in the plasmasphere.