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Abstract:
Described is recent work with measurements from a sensitive pressure sensor mounted on the ram face of a satellite sampling the altitude range 128-350 km in a Sun-synchronous dawn-dusk orbit. The sensor returned 20 measurements per second, yielding 400-m horizontal resolution of thermospheric phenomena in this altitude range. Ubiquitous large-scale wavelike signatures are observed at high latitudes during the day and at night. Copious amount of small-scale structure, down to the resolution limit of the instrument, are also detected around the orbit, but especially at high and equatorial latitudes. These signatures are discussed in terms of their characteristics (scale size; domain in latitude, local time, and altitude; occurrence frequency; and persistence) and interpreted in terms of wave evolution and ion-neutral coupling. These observations are expected to inform the forthcoming LLITED, GDC, and DYNAMIC missions.
