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Burns et al. 2003
Burns, G.B., Kawahara, T.D., French, W.J.R., Nomura, A. and Klekociuk, A.R. (2003). A comparison of hydroxyl rotational temperatures from Davis (69°S, 78°E) with sodium lidar temperatures from Syowa (69°S, 39°E). Geophysical Research Letters 30: doi: 10.1029/2002GL016413. issn: 0094-8276.

We report the first substantive inter-site comparison of high southern latitude mesopause region winter temperatures. Davis (69¿S, 78¿E) hydroxyl rotational nightly-mean temperatures are significantly correlated with Syowa (69¿S, 39¿E) sodium lidar nightly-mean temperatures at 87 km made in 2000 (correlation coefficient of 0.68) and 2001 (0.51) despite a site separation of ~1500 km. The Davis winter average temperature in 2001, 203 K, differs from the Syowa value of 201 K only by the uncertainty in the measurement. A more substantial 7 K separates the year 2000 winter averages, Davis again being warmer. The temperature difference between the sites is attributed to either variations in the hydroxyl layer or short-term cooling events in the mesopause region above Syowa that are not detected above Davis. Syowa winter temperatures at 87 km are ~7 K cooler than for an equivalent latitude northern hemisphere site.

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Abstract

Keywords
Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Airglow and aurora, Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Middle atmosphere--energy deposition, Atmospheric Composition and Structure, Middle atmosphere--constituent transport and chemistry
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
http://www.agu.org/journals/gl/
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
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