Statistical Analysis of TEC Enhancements during Geomagnetic Disturbances in Extreme Solar Conditions

Abstract:

In the past decades, a remarkable set of comprehensive studies and review articles enriched theresearch of the Earth’s ionospheric response to geomagnetic disturbances[Prolss, 1995; Buonsanto,1999; Mendillo, 2006]. However, comparative studies of TEC response during geomagnetic disturbances in solar minimum and solar maximum have not been reported yet. Here we present some new results of TEC enhancements during geomagnetic disturbancesin extreme solar maximum and deep solar minimum.

The JPL TEC maps from 12/01/2000 to 12/31/2003 during high solar activity and from 01/01/2007 to 12/31/2010 during low solar activity are used. The deviation of TEC is defined as the differences between TEC and TECq, which represents the 27-day sliding smooth median. The geomagnetic disturbances selected have peaks of geomagnetic index Ap>20. We found that the winter anomaly appears in both extreme solar cycle conditions and has longer-lived patterns than other seasons.The nighttime enhancement is more significant in solar maximum than solar minimum. The mean duration of TEC enhancements is longer in solar minimum than solar maximum. The mean delay at the beginning of positive anomaly responds fastest at around 1500 LT and slowest at around midnight during solar minimum.The mean intensity of enhancements is stronger at higher latitudes and weaker at lower latitudes, and the mean delay is smaller at higher latitudes and larger at lower latitudes in both extreme solar cycle conditions.

Acknowledgments: Thiswork was supportedby the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grants 41204107. We thank JPL and Word Data Center for Geomagnetism at Kyoto University for making available the data.

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