New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements
Abstract A newly released, novel ionospheric data set of global gridded vertical total electron content (VTEC) is introduced in this paper. This VTEC data set, provided by Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), is derived from very high frequency (VHF; defined as 30–300 MHz) broadband radio‐frequenc...
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Wiley
2022-05-01
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| Series: | Space Weather |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1029/2022SW003067 |
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| author | Erin H. Lay Jeffery D. Tippmann Kyle C. Wiens Sarah E. McDonald Anthony J. Mannucci Xiaoqing Pi Anthea Coster R. Marc Kippen Michael J. Peterson Rob Redmon |
| author_facet | Erin H. Lay Jeffery D. Tippmann Kyle C. Wiens Sarah E. McDonald Anthony J. Mannucci Xiaoqing Pi Anthea Coster R. Marc Kippen Michael J. Peterson Rob Redmon |
| author_sort | Erin H. Lay |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract A newly released, novel ionospheric data set of global gridded vertical total electron content (VTEC) is introduced in this paper. This VTEC data set, provided by Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), is derived from very high frequency (VHF; defined as 30–300 MHz) broadband radio‐frequency (RF) measurements of lightning made by U.S. Department of Defense sensing systems on board Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites. This paper presents the new data set (LANL VTEC), discusses the errors inherent in VHF TEC estimation due to ionospheric dispersion, and compares the LANL VTEC to two community standard VTEC gridded products: Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Global Ionospheric Model (JPL GIM) and the CEDAR community's Open Madrigal VTEC gridded measurements of L‐band GNSS (global navigation satellite systems) TEC. We find that the LANL VTEC data have an offset of 3 TECU from CEDAR Madrigal GNSS VTEC and a full‐width‐half‐maximum (FWHM) of 6 TECU. In comparison, the offset between LANL VTEC and the JPL GIM model is −3 TECU, but with a FWHM of 5 TECU. We also compare to Jason‐3 VTEC measurements over the ocean, finding an offset of less than 0.5 TECU and an FWHM of <5 TECU. Because this technique uses a completely different methodology to determine TEC, the sources of errors are distinct from the typical ground‐based GNSS L‐band (GHz) TEC measurements. Also, because it is derived from RF lightning signals, this data set provides measurements in regions that are not well covered by ground‐based GPS measurements, such as over oceans and over central Africa. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-953e2052c2fd4a118c8f69853e4e5100 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1542-7390 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2022-05-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Space Weather |
| spelling | doaj-art-953e2052c2fd4a118c8f69853e4e51002025-01-14T16:31:05ZengWileySpace Weather1542-73902022-05-01205n/an/a10.1029/2022SW003067New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric MeasurementsErin H. Lay0Jeffery D. Tippmann1Kyle C. Wiens2Sarah E. McDonald3Anthony J. Mannucci4Xiaoqing Pi5Anthea Coster6R. Marc Kippen7Michael J. Peterson8Rob Redmon9Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos NM USALos Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos NM USALos Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos NM USASpace Science Division Naval Research Laboratory Washington DC USAJet Propulsion Laboratory California Institute of Technology Pasadena CA USAJet Propulsion Laboratory California Institute of Technology Pasadena CA USAMIT Haystack Observatory Westford MA USALos Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos NM USALos Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos NM USANational Centers for Environmental Information, NOAA Boulder CO USAAbstract A newly released, novel ionospheric data set of global gridded vertical total electron content (VTEC) is introduced in this paper. This VTEC data set, provided by Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), is derived from very high frequency (VHF; defined as 30–300 MHz) broadband radio‐frequency (RF) measurements of lightning made by U.S. Department of Defense sensing systems on board Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites. This paper presents the new data set (LANL VTEC), discusses the errors inherent in VHF TEC estimation due to ionospheric dispersion, and compares the LANL VTEC to two community standard VTEC gridded products: Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Global Ionospheric Model (JPL GIM) and the CEDAR community's Open Madrigal VTEC gridded measurements of L‐band GNSS (global navigation satellite systems) TEC. We find that the LANL VTEC data have an offset of 3 TECU from CEDAR Madrigal GNSS VTEC and a full‐width‐half‐maximum (FWHM) of 6 TECU. In comparison, the offset between LANL VTEC and the JPL GIM model is −3 TECU, but with a FWHM of 5 TECU. We also compare to Jason‐3 VTEC measurements over the ocean, finding an offset of less than 0.5 TECU and an FWHM of <5 TECU. Because this technique uses a completely different methodology to determine TEC, the sources of errors are distinct from the typical ground‐based GNSS L‐band (GHz) TEC measurements. Also, because it is derived from RF lightning signals, this data set provides measurements in regions that are not well covered by ground‐based GPS measurements, such as over oceans and over central Africa.https://doi.org/10.1029/2022SW003067ionospheretotal electron contentlightningradio frequency |
| spellingShingle | Erin H. Lay Jeffery D. Tippmann Kyle C. Wiens Sarah E. McDonald Anthony J. Mannucci Xiaoqing Pi Anthea Coster R. Marc Kippen Michael J. Peterson Rob Redmon New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements Space Weather ionosphere total electron content lightning radio frequency |
| title | New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements |
| title_full | New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements |
| title_fullStr | New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements |
| title_full_unstemmed | New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements |
| title_short | New Lightning‐Derived Vertical Total Electron Content Data Provide Unique Global Ionospheric Measurements |
| title_sort | new lightning derived vertical total electron content data provide unique global ionospheric measurements |
| topic | ionosphere total electron content lightning radio frequency |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1029/2022SW003067 |
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