Radio Sources and Scintillation

A review is given of the interplay between studies of compact radio sources and the scattering and scintillations that occur as the signals travel through the irregular refractive index of the interstellar and interplanetary plasmas. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

海水中234Th的超低水平液闪谱仪测定

本文提出了利用超低水平液闪谱仪测定海水中234Th的方法.海水经氢氧化铁吸附共沉淀富集后,接着用阴离子交换和TBP/煤油萃取进行Th同位素的分离与纯化.对一系列测定条件进行了详细的研究,提出了测定海水中234Th的适宜程序,即在含有234Th和产额示踪剂230Th的纯化后的5mol/dm3HNO3溶液中加入TBP/煤油进行萃取,然后用0.1mol/dm3HNO3反萃取,后者是先用契伦柯夫计数法测量234Th(通过234mPa),后加入闪烁液Hisafe 3用α/β模式测量α放射体230Th.对于α和β放射体液闪谱仪的计数效率分别为100%和55.7%±2.7%.234Th的化学回收率和总探测效率分别为70%～80%和30%～45%.该法测定海水中的234Th快速、简便和高效.     

GPS observations of the ionospheric F2-layer behavior during the 20th November 2003 geomagnetic storm over South Korea

The ionospheric F2-layer peak density (NmF2) and its height (hmF2) are of great influence on the shape of the ionospheric electron density profile Ne (h) and may be indicative of other physical processes within the ionosphere, especially those due to geomagnetic storms. Such parameters are often estimated using models such as the semiempirical international reference ionosphere (IRI) models or are measured using moderately priced to expensive instrumentation, such as ionosondes or incoherent scatter radars. Global positioning system (GPS) observations have become a powerful tool for mapping high-resolution ionospheric structures, which can be used to study the ionospheric response to geomagnetic storms. In this paper, we describe how 3-D ionospheric electron density profiles were produced from data of the dense permanent Korean GPS network using the tomography reconstruction technique. These profiles are verified by independent ionosonde data. The responses of GPS-derived parameters at the ionospheric F2-layer to the 20th November 2003 geomagnetic storm over South Korea are investigated. A fairly large increase in the electron density at the F2-layer peak (the NmF2) (positive storm) has been observed during this storm, which is accompanied by a significant uplift in the height of the F2 layer peak (the hmF2). This is confirmed by independent ionosonde observations. We suggest that the F2-layer peak height uplift and NmF2 increase are mainly associated with a strong eastward electric field, and are not associated with the increase of the O/N₂ ratio obtained from the GUVI instruments aboard the TIMED satellite. It is also inferred that the increase in NmF2 is not caused by the changes in neutral composition, but is related to other nonchemical effects, such as dynamical changes of vertical ion motions induced by winds and E × B drifts, tides and waves in the mesosphere/lower thermosphere region, which can be dynamically coupled upward to generate ionospheric perturbations and oscillations.     

Spin rate estimation of sounding rockets using GPS wind-up

Carrier phase wind-up is a well-known effect that arises from the relative rotation between a transmitting and receiving antenna. In GPS measurements at L1 frequency, this effect translates into an error of 19.029 cm per full relative rotation of antennas. Since this effect is independent of the satellite elevation for pure rotation about the antenna boresight axis, it is usually absorbed by the clock estimation in navigation algorithms. Therefore, the impact of wind-up is usually neglected for applications that do not require accuracies to the cm level like RTK. However, in receiving platforms with high rotation rate, the accumulated wind-up value can be important and actually be larger than receiver noise or even ionospheric variations. Therefore, in such scenarios, the wind-up contribution can be isolated and used as a source of information to compute the spin rate of such platforms using an appropriate combination of GPS observables. This work shows some results of a coarse, yet simple, approach to monitor the rotation angle and spin-rate of spin stabilized sounding rockets flown by DLR.     

热层风场的理论模拟与分析

通过求解中性大气Navier Stokes动量方程建立了一个时变的三维风场理论模式，利用目前新版的中性大气模式NRLMSISE 00及国际电离层参考模式IRI2000作为输入参数给出热层风场. 基于该模式，计算得到中等太阳活动年磁静日风场的变化形态及其受电场和离子曳力的影响. 同时，将Navier Stokes动量方程作不同形式的简化，并利用简化模式与本文的模式计算结果的对比，分析中性大气Navier Stokes动量方程中黏性项以及非线性项(U·Δ)U的作用. 结果表明，本文所建立伪三维风场模式给出的结果更为合理，而简化模式在某些地区尤其在低纬和赤道区不适用，黏性项及非线性项的作用不可忽略. 本文所建立的风场模式将对研究电离层动力学过程、电离层与热层的耦合过程以及空间天气学研究都有着重要意义.     

Monte Carlo simulation of scintillation crystal detector for formation element logging

Formation elements logging is a neutron gamma spectroscopy logging technique used to acquire the content of elements and minerals by recording the gamma ray produced by the reaction of neutron and elemental nucleus in the formation. It has a wide usage in discriminating complex lithology and evaluating unconventional reservoir. The Monte Carlo simulation model of formation elements logging tool is established in this paper, with which the effects of tool parameters including the material and length of the scintillation crystal and source spacing on logging responses are modeled. The results show that the energy response of LaBr_3: Ce crystal is better than others, and the detection efficiency increases with the crystal length but decrease with source spacing. The above results may be used as a reference for optimizing the tool structure design.     

南极中山站电离层F2层临界频率变化特征

对南极中山站数字式电离层测高仪1995～2002年观测数据的月中值进行了统计分析,揭示了中山站电离层F2层临界频率（foF2）的主要特征：foF2存在明显的日变化和年变化;日变化存在“磁中午异常”现象;年变化中中午foF2在太阳活动低年不出现“冬季异常”,在太阳活动高年出现“半年异常”,即两分点高于两至点.本文结合中山站所处的地理位置,考虑太阳辐射电离、磁层的驱动和中性大气成分变化等因素,分析了这些现象的产生机理.     

Total electron content processing from GPS observations to facilitate ionospheric modeling

With the increasing global distribution of high rate dual-frequency global positioning system (GPS) receivers, the production of a real-time atmospheric constituent definition, total electron content (TEC), has become a beneficial contributor to the modeling applications used in the assessment of GPS position accuracy and the composition of the ionosphere, plasmasphere, and troposphere. Historically, TEC measurements have been obtained through post processing techniques to produce the quality of data necessary for modeling applications with rigorous error estimate requirements. These procedures necessitated the collection of large volumes of data to address the various abnormalities in the computation of TEC associated with the use of greater data quality controls and source selection while real-time modeling environments must rely on autonomous controls and filtration techniques to prevent the production of erroneous model results. In this paper we present methods for processing TEC in real time, which utilize several procedures including the application of an ionospheric model to automatically perform quality control on the TEC output and the computational techniques used to address receiver multipath, faulty receiver observations, cycle-slips, segmented processing, and receiver calibrations. The resulting TEC measurements are provided with rigorous error estimates validated using the vertical TEC from the Jason satellite mission.

大气掩星反演误差特性初步分析

GPS大气掩星探测技术可以获得全球大气折射率、气压、密度、温度和水汽压等气象参数,该技术基本原理是基于几何光学近似的Abel积分反演.地球扁率、电离层传播时间延迟、大气大尺度水平梯度、多路径传播现象等因素在某些高度范围影响大气反演的精度.本文采用模拟的方法,分析其中地球扁率及电离层对反演结果的影响,并讨论局部圆弧修正及电离层修正的效果.利用CHAMP掩星实测轨道数据和有关电离层和大气经验模式、采用三维射线追踪方法模拟计算几种情形下的GPS掩星观测附加相位数据,对模拟数据进行反演,将反演气象参量剖面与模拟时给定模式剖面进行比较,得到了0～60 km高度范围内的反演误差.误差统计分析结果表明,局部圆弧中心的修正以及电离层修正,对于高精度的GPS掩星反演是非常重要的;电离层修正残差仍是制约30～60 km高度范围内反演精度的重要因素,进一步完善和优化大气掩星反演需要发展新的电离层修正算法.