LONG TERM STUDY OF GRAVITY WAVES PROPERTIES USING THE RADIO OCCULTATION TECHNIQUES

P. LLAMEDO, T. SCHMIDT, A. DE LA TORRE, A. FABER, R. HIERRO, P. ALEXANDER, J. WICKERT

Buenos Aires

Workshop; 7th IAGA / ICMA / CAWSES Workshop on Long-Term Changes and Trends in the Atmosphere; 2012

IAGA / ICMA / CAWSES

The Global Positioning System Radio Occultation (GPS RO) technique provides high vertical resolution profiles of refractivity from which other properties such as temperature and water vapor can be derived. GPS RO is one well-established technique for obtaining global gravity wave (GW) information from temperature profiles. Since 2001 several satellite missions have been providing an almost uniform global coverage and all-weather capability allowing long term studies of meteorological phenomena and in particular the gravity wave activity. The GWs analysis is based on the proper extraction of the perturbation temperature. In order to quantify the effect of small scale GWs alone, it is important to separate them from the planetary waves. Different filtering techniques are applied and the results are discussed. A climatological study over 10 years of global observations of GW and their characteristics is done and possible trends are discussed. A climatological study of the vertical wavelength (fv) the specific potential energy (Ep) and an estimation vertical flux of horizontal momentum (MF) is done and possible trends are discussed.