An evidence on the lithosphere-ionosphere coupling in terms of atmospheric gravity waves on the basis of a combined analysis of surface pressure, ionospheric perturbations and ground-based ULF variations

Abstract

One major candidate of lithosphere-atmosphere-ionosphere (LAI) coupling mechanism is through atmospheric oscillations triggered near Earth’s surface due to some pre-earthquake (EQ) effect, and this channel has been extensively proved by using meteorological disturbances much more easily treated than pre-EQ effects (Korepanov et al., 2009). In the present paper this channel is challengingly studied, for the first time, for pre-EQ phenomena, and we take a rather strong EQ named Niigata-chuetsu EQ on 23 October, 2004 (with magnitude of 6.8 and with depth of 13 km) for which we already know that the ionospheric perturbation did take place prior to the EQ (Hayakawa et al., 2006). In this paper the LAI coupling has been intensively studied by means of coordinated observational data (surface atmospheric pressure data as an indicator of atmospheric gravity waves (AGWs), our own subionospheric VLF/LF data as a measure of ionospheric perturbations and the ground-based ULF data as a measure to monitor the modulation in the ionospheric dynamic region). The wavelet analyses for these parameters in different spatial regions have all indicated the enhancements of fluctuations in the wave frequency of 10 ~ 100 min (in the frequency range of AGWs). The correlation of wavelet spectra between the atmospheric pressure and VLF/LF amplitude has yielded a high value with the delay of a few hours, while there is nearly no distinct delay of the wavelet spectra between the ionospheric perturbation and the ground-based ULF fluctuation. These observational facts are compared with the theoretical estimation of AGW hypothesis, which may provide a convincing support to the AGW channel of the LAI coupling.