Annual and semiannual harmonics of wind in the Northern stratosphere, mesosphere, and lower thermosphere

Abstract

Based on the UK MetOffice gridded analysis in the altitudes from the tropopause to the mesopause of the Northern Hemisphere and the meteor radar observations in the mesosphere/lower thermosphere over Kazan (56°N49°E) and Collm (51°N13°E), the annual and semiannual harmonics of the horizontal wind components in the stratosphere, mesosphere, and lower thermosphere are studied for the period 2004–2013. The maxima of the amplitude of the annual harmonics of zonal wind are much more pronounced than the respective maxima for meridional wind. In contrast, the magnitudes of the maxima of the semiannual harmonics are comparable between zonal and meridional wind. The annual harmonics of horizontal wind in the studied layer typically reaches maximum in January–February. The semiannual harmonics of the components of horizontal wind in the stratosphere–lower thermosphere layer basically attains it first maximum in spring or in early summer. The results, included in the present paper, may be used for climate models validation.