HR: 1340h
AN: SA13A-0227    [Abstracts]
TI: Using Sun Spikes to Measure Mesospheric Conductivity
AU: * Shimogawa, M R
EM: shimo@u.washington.edu
AF: University of Washington, Box 351310, Seattle, WA 98195-1310 United States
AU: Holzworth, R H
EM: bobholz@ess.washington.edu
AF: University of Washington, Box 351310, Seattle, WA 98195-1310 United States
AB: Our payload was designed to study the electrodynamics of noctilucent clouds (NLCs) using double Langmuir probes. Sun spikes in the probe voltage, which occur naturally when a probe is shadowed by the rocket body, were two to three times larger when the rocket was above the NLC than when below it, on both the upleg and downleg portions of the flight. In the low conductivity found below the NLC, the sun spikes did not saturate, so a rough conductivity measurement could be made using these sun spike data. We found the conductivity to be about 8×10^-10>S/m at 80 km altitude, which is in agreement with measurements made of the positive ion conductivity during the flight. This is effectively the same as the relaxation method for measuring conductivity in the lower atmosphere, shown here to work in the mesosphere.
DE: 3304 Atmospheric electricity
DE: 3311 Clouds and aerosols
DE: 3332 Mesospheric dynamics
SC: SPA-Aeronomy [SA]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005