Upper Atmospheric and Ionospheric Data - IPST_UMD_ANTARCTIC_IONOS

The projects that operate from instrumentation at South Pole Station, and at the Arrival Heights Laboratory at McMurdo Station, examine natural phenomena occurring in the earth's atmosphere, ionosphere, and magnetosphere. The broad focus of these science programs is toward improved understanding of the mechanisms that couple solar processes into the terrestrial environment; these include investigations of phenomena associated with short-term environmental effects (auroras, induced electrical currents, radiowave communications interference), as well as those associated with longer-term effects (changes in the ozone layer, atmospheric composition studies, stratospheric winds, weather, and even climate). Instruments for these tasks include optical and radio devices for remote sensing, as well as sensors that monitor changes in the electric and magnetic fields at the station; the instruments that measure local fields (including VLF receivers) are sensitive to perturbations that propagate from remote generation regions.