Validation Study of the Ionospheric Forecast Model Using the TOPEX TEC Measurements

Authors

L. Zhu
Robert W. Schunk, Utah State UniversityFollow
G. Jee
Ludger Scherliess, Utah State UniversityFollow
Jan Josef Sojka, Utah State UniversityFollow
Donald C. Thompson, Utah State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Radio Science

Volume

41

Issue

RS5S11

Publisher

American Geophysical Union

Publication Date

2006

Abstract

As a part of the validation program in the Utah State University Global Assimilation of Ionospheric Measurement (GAIM) project, a newly improved Ionosphere Forecast Model (IFM) was systematically validated by using a large database of TOPEX total electron content (TEC) measurements. The TOPEX data used for the validation are for the period from August 1992 to March 2003, and the total number of 18-s averaged data is close to 11 million. This model validation work covers a wide range of seasonal (winter, summer, and equinox) and solar (low-F 10.7, median F 10.7, and high-F 10.7) conditions as well as all UT variations with the focus on nonstorm time TEC. The validation results indicate that the features of the spatial distribution of the IFM TEC are systematically consistent with those of the TOPEX TEC. The differences between the IFM TEC and the TOPEX TEC are within 20% for almost all locations and conditions. For many conditions, the differences are even below 10%.

Comments

Originally published by the American Geophysical Union in Radio Science.

Recommended Citation

Zhu, L., R. W. Schunk, G. Jee, L. Scherliess, J. J. Sojka, and D. C. Thompson (2006), Validation study of the Ionosphere Forecast Model using the TOPEX total electron content measurements, Radio Sci., 41, RS5S11, doi:10.1029/2005RS003336.