Ionospheric Anomlies

AZPILICUETA F.

Conferencia; Pan-American Advanced Studies Institute School and Workshop on the Dynamics and Chemistry of the Upper Atmosphere; 2010

Since the beginning of the pioneering scientific works on the ionosphere unusual responses were reported and named semi-annual and annual anomalies due to their un-explained and periodical nature. Despite more that sixty years of scientific and technological achievements, a definitive explanation could not be found to these intriguing phenomena and, on the contrary, similar anomalies were found in other geophysical phenomena. The best candidate for being the driving force behind the anomalies was the solar wind, but the contemporary theories of the behavior of the Earth magnetosphere precluded the description of a causal mechanism. Here we present a mechanism of energy transfer from the magnetosphere to the ionosphere that can explain both anomalies. The importance of this theory is that it makes available a secondary source of energy to the Earth’s upper atmosphere and ionosphere that energy to the Earth’s upper atmosphere and ionosphere that could be as high as forty percent of the energy budget in the ultra-violet and extreme ultra-violet regions of the solar electromagnetic spectrum.This will be of importance to thermospheric, ionospheric, magnetospheric and space physics research.