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Sharma & Duff 1997
Sharma, R.D. and Duff, J.W. (1997). Determination of the translational temperature of the high altitude terrestrial thermosphere from the rotational distribution of the 5.3 µm emission from NO(v=1). Geophysical Research Letters 24: doi: 10.1029/97GL02458. issn: 0094-8276.

The rotational distribution of vibrationally excited nitric oxide produced by impacts with atomic oxygen is investigated using a quasiclassical trajectory approach. The present study confirms the earlier result that the nascent rotational distribution may be described by a Maxwell-Boltzmann (MB) distribution. It further shows that the temperature describing the nascent distribution is about 25% lower than the translational temperature and equals it after 3 to 5 collisions. Translational temperature as function of altitude is derived from the nighttime rotational distribution of the 5.3 &mgr;m emission observed by c_ryogenic i_nfrar_ed r_adi_ance for s_huttle (CIRRIS 1A) and compared with the mass spectrometer incoherent scatter (MSIS) model temperature. Because of the strong 5.3 &mgr;m emission this method has larger signal than the N+O radiative recombination currently used to determine the nighttime thermospheric temperatures. ¿ 1997 American Geophysical Union

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Abstract

Keywords
Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Airglow and aurora, Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Thermosphere—composition and chemistry, Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Pressure, density, and temperature
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
http://www.agu.org/journals/gl/
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
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