METHOD OF DETERMINING SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION OF IONOSPHERIC INHOMOGENEITIES Russian patent published in 2014 - IPC G01S13/95 

FIELD: physics.

SUBSTANCE: invention relates to radiophysical methods of investigating the ionosphere and is intended for determining spatial distribution of ionospheric inhomogeneities by a radar method using a linear FM ionosonde-radio direction-finder. The method includes probing the ionosphere with a broadband chirp signal; receiving the emitted chirp signal synchronously with transmission thereof; measuring the distance-frequency characteristics (DFC) and angular frequency characteristics (AFC) of all received signals (forward and scattered by ionospheric inhomogeneities); based on an ionospheric model and the measured DFC and AFC, calculating characteristics of the forward signal propagating on an arc of a large circle between the transmitter and the receiver; correcting the ionospheric model until the measured and calculated characteristics of the forward signal match; for the calculated ionospheric model and measurement data of the DFC and AFC of the scattered signal, calculating characteristics of the scattered signal until the measured and calculated data match and determining spatial distribution of ionospheric inhomogeneities based thereon.

EFFECT: high accuracy of determining spatial distribution of small-scale inhomogeneities of electron concentration, provided by increasing the probing frequency to a value higher than the critical frequency of the ionospheric F-layer, for detecting signals scattered by the ionospheric inhomogeneities with high frequency-time resolution, and positioning the inhomogeneities.

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